SFI activist stabbed to death in Kerala

A 20-year-old activist of pro-CPI(M) student outfit SFI, Abhimanyu, was stabbed to death in the famous Maharaja’s College in Kochi Sunday midnight allegedly by Islamists belonging to the Campus Front of India and SDPI, student and political wings respectively of the Popular Front of India.

Two other students, also belonging to the SFI, were injured in the Islamists’ attack and the condition of one of them, Arjun from Kottayam, was stated to be serious. Three Campus Front-SDPI activists were taken into custody on Monday morning itself, according to the police. Abhimanyu was also a member of the SFI’s Idukki district committee.

Abhimanyu, a second-year degree student from a poor family in Vattavada in Idukki district, was stabbed to death by a gang of 20 Islamists, majority of whom were outsiders who invaded the campus, following a dispute over sticking posters on college walls for welcoming new students to the college on Monday, the  first day of the new academic year. 

The incident triggered protests across the State against turning campuses into killing fields. Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, who also holds the Home portfolio, said preliminary inquiries had confirmed that people of extremist orientation were behind Abhimanyu’s killing and that stringent action would be taken against the culprits.

Those taken into custody were identified as Bilal of Kottayam, Farooq from Pathanamthitta and Riyas of Fort Kochi. The police indicated that the remaining culprits including Muhammad, the person who had invited the gang of Islamists to the college, might have left Kochi. The police have also identified ten other members of the gang.

Eyewitness Ananthu, a student of the college and also an SFI activist, said there were around 20 men in the gang that had invaded the campus Sunday midnight and stabbed Abhimanyu to death. He also said that only one in the gang was a student of Maharaja’s and that the gang had come prepared to attack the pro-CPI(M) students.

“They reached the college gates at midnight and wanted to enter the campus but we opposed it. Amidst the dispute, someone from the gang took out a knife and waved it at us forcing us to disperse. One member of the gang chased Abhimanyu and stabbed him,” Ananthu said, adding that he did not think a small dispute could develop into such a gruesome incident.

Students of the college said that tension had been prevailing for the past few days between the SFI and the Campus Front over the latter’s efforts to gain a foothold in the college which is seen as one of the strongest fortresses of the SFI in Kerala. They said the gang had come well-prepared with weapons and their attack was obviously preplanned.

Stating that the attack was preplanned, the Chief Minister said the secular society should unite against religious extremism. State CPI(M) secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan said that the murder of the SFI activist was part of a well-planned bid by extremist forces that had been swept away from the campuses to establish their domination over students by terrorizing them.

Finance Minister TM Thomas Isaac, a former student of Maharaja’s College, said, “The Campus Front has been on a provocative campaign in the college for some time. We will confront these forces of communalism politically.” College principal KN Krishnakumar said enforcing a code of conduct for students would have to be considered in the context of the incident.