Cops and protesters clashed at the Aligarh Muslim University today.
Out to control a students' march at the Aligarh Muslim University, the city police were caught on camera vandalising two-wheelers on the city roads. Late this evening, the police had clashed with the students, who were trying to hold a solidarity march for their counterparts at Delhi's Jamia Millia Islamia. In videos circulated from the Aligarh campus on social media, at least three policemen were seen injured as the students targeted them with stones.
The trouble started after news from Delhi, where a protest march by the Jamia students had gone awry, ending in a pitched battle with the police. Vehicles were set ablaze and vandalised and the police were targeted - by people the students said were outsiders who had joined the protest. Soon after, the police had entered the campus without clearance and detained around 100 students. The university said they had also assaulted the staff and the students.
As the Aligarh students started a late evening solidarity march, the police had tried to stop them at the gates of the university, initially using batons and then tear gas and water cannons. Later, disturbing visuals emerged, showing the police smashing bikes on the streets in Aligarh, firing tear gas shells from the main gate of the campus amid protests at the university.
AMU Proctor Professor Afifullah Khan said some security personnel were injured in the protests, news agency PTI reported. In a mobile clip, a senior officer of the Rapid Action Force is seen injured as he urges colleagues to give him his helmet.
An hour before midnight, anti-riot vehicles of the Aligarh police were seen entering the university.