Protests rock KU against 'harassment' of Kashmiri students in AMU

Srinagar, Oct 15: Scores of Kashmir University (KU) students on Monday held a protest rally in their campus against the alleged harassment of Kashmiri students in Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) for offering in absentia funeral prayers for scholar-turned-militant Mannan Wani.

The KU students from different departments this morning assembled outside Humanities Block and took out a protest rally within the university campus. The students were protesting against alleged harassment of Kashmiri students in AMU, including slapping of sedation charge and suspension of three students.

The protesting students were also carrying banners with pictures of former KU faculty member-turned-militant Dr Rafi Bhat, who was killed in an encounter with security forces in March this year. The students later dispersed peacefully.

Meanwhile, several hundred Kashmiri students studying at the AMU have threatened to leave for their homes on October 17, if the sedition charges against three of them were not dropped.

Three Kashmiri students of AMU were booked on sedition charges for allegedly raising "anti-India" slogans and trying to hold a prayer meeting for Wani.

Wani, who was a PhD scholar in AMU before picking up the gun in January 2018, was among two militants killed in a fierce encounter that ensued during a Cordon and Search Operation (CASO) launched by security forces in Kupwara on October 11.