Protests for DU reopening intensified on Tuesday (Express photo) An activist of the Chhatra Yuva Sangharsh Samiti (CYSS), the students’ wing of the Aam Aadmi Party, doused himself with petrol and Left organisations held agitations as the protests over demand for reopening of Delhi University (DU) intensified on Tuesday.
The second day of protests saw Left organisations—Students’ Federation of India (SFI), All India Students’ Association (AISA) and the Krantikari Yuva Sangathan (KYS), among others—holding joint protests, organising a ‘chakka jam’ outside the arts faculty building. The protesters marched from Patel Chest to the arts faculty building, before sitting down on the main Chhatra Marg road of the university. There was heavy deployment of police and CISF personnel opposite the arts faculty building.
Students protest in DU on Tuesday (Express photo) On Monday, the students had protested outside the vice-chancellor’s office.
Meanwhile, a separate group of around 20 CYSS activists also came to the protest site at around 1 pm. They insisted that though the issue was the same, they wanted to protest separately. Rishi Kumar Gupta, CYSS State General Secretary, said, “We are here to demand that DU be reopened immediately. Students are getting seriously inconvenienced. But we will protest independently. We won’t take part in joint agitations along with the Left organisations because of ideological differences.”
At around 1:40 pm, Kamal Tiwari, a CYSS activist and first year student of MA in Buddhist Studies, while protesting against the delay in reopening DU, doused himself with petrol. He also produced a matchstick but was whisked away by the police before he could light it.
People poured water on him, after which he was rushed to the hospital. Before being taken away in a police car, he told reporters, “They have wasted three years of life. We have been sitting at home all this while.”
Kamal Tiwari being taken away by cops after he doused himself with petrol. (Express photo) Meanwhile, till around 2:30 pm, the ‘chakka jam’ by Left organisations was still on, even as the CYSS contingent retreated. Slogans of “dera daal (occupy)”, “DU tumko kholna hoga (you will have to open DU)”, and “DU humare aapka, nahi kisi ke baap ka (DU belongs to you and me, not to anybody’s father) were raised as students protested with placards.
Addressing students, Abhishek Kumar, SFI DU Co-Convenor, said, “The time for sending memoranda is over. The DU administration should know that now we will protest continuously, every day, till our demands are met.”
Abhigyan from AISA also said, “We demand that the vice-chancellor come out and speak to us. We will not move till DU brings out a notice on the reopening and the VC meets us. We will keep sitting here.”
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