Delhi Police on Saturday said they had contacted two more people suspected of being involved in the Jawaharlal Nehru University violence and have asked them to appear before them and join the investigations. The two men — Rohit and Akshat Awasthi — were identified after tapes of a sting operation done by India Today news channel were aired on Friday evening, police said.
Deputy commissioner of police (crime) Joy Tirkey said while Rohit did not respond, Awasthi promised to join the investigations but failed to turn up on Saturday . “While we could not reach out to Rohit, we are waiting for Awasthi to approach us,” he said, adding that they will be questioned regarding the violence.
In the sting done by India Today, the two — Shah and Awasthi — are seen testifying to their involvement in assault and being a part of the mob that led violence in JNU on January 5.
The DCP also said they have sent notices to the nine students of Jawaharlal Nehru University, who they had identified on Friday. Police said notices have also been served to 37 others who were found to be members of a WhatsApp group, which was active during the January 5 violence.
However, Tirkey said they are not sure if all 37, who have been asked to join the probe, are students of the university.
“This WhatsApp group that was named ‘Unity Against Left’. It was formed by Yogender Bhardwaj, one of the nine students we identified on Friday. We have identified the 37 members of the group and have found that their addresses are scattered across Delhi. We are yet to meet them to ascertain whether they are outsiders or university students. Their involvement in violence is being probed. Their affiliation to any political or students group is as of now unknown to us,” the DCP said. No arrests had been made so far, the DCP added.
Incidents of violence were first reported from JNU on January 3 when two students groups allegedly clashed over the semester registration process.. Violence was again reported on January 4. Things turned ugly on January 5 when a number of masked people armed with sticks and sledgehammer were seen vandalizing hostels, thrashing and threatening students.
The ABVP had on Friday confirmed that Bhardwaj and Patel were members of the outfit but denied their role in the violence. Nidhi Tripathi, student of JNU and ABVP national general secretary, had said on Friday that Bhardwaj had created the WhatsApp group to help each other after violence broke out in the campus.
A number of video recording and pictures of the violence and vandalism were widely shared on social media later.
The investigations of the violence was handed over to a special investigation team of the crime branch that is being headed by DCP Tirkey.
So far the Delhi police have registered three FIRs in the violence, which happened over three days. Tirkey said they have received close to 15 different written complaints, which they are looking into.
Tirkey said so far they have recorded statements of over 30 persons, including wardens, teachers, injured students, security officers and other staff of the university. “We are trying to establish the sequence of incidents. Since CCTV footages from the campus were not available to us as the server room was targeted on the first day of violence, we are mostly resorting to viral videos and footages of the incident,” he said.
The DCP also said after India Today came out with its sting of some students, who allegedly confessed to have indulged and having led the violence, they swung into acton and contacted two of them.
When asked, if Vikas Patel, who was identified by the police on Friday, was holding a polycarbonate lathi used by cops, the DCP said they were not sure of that. “We are not sure if it was a lathi used by our men. We are yet to get to the source of the lathi, which he was holding. We are in middle of our investigation,” he said.
Turkey also said that they are in the process of identifying some other masked people, who were seen in the viral videos and pictures indulging in violence. “We have video footages and pictures that were being shared on social media and are using them to identify masked attackers on campus,” he said.
