Protesting JNU Students Manhandle Journalists, Target Police Personnel Deployed To Control The Situation

The protest on Monday (11 November) by students of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), against the draft hostel manual and a proposed fee hike by the administration, also made the media its target. While the road leading to the campus was blocked for hours since the morning, three female journalists were reportedly manhandled by the protesting students.

Though efforts made to contact two of them didn't yield any result, Anupam Gautam from IANS TV narrated the entire incident.

"While I was taking a few shots of the protests, some of the students surrounded me and started raising 'Godi Media Go Back' and other slogans. One male student blocked my way and tried to snatch away my camera," Gautam said.

"They also tried to grab me, twisted my arms and attempted to break my equipment. They also hurled abuses at me and my fellow reporters covering the incident," Gautam added.

For the entire day, media remained a target of the students who constantly hurled abuses on the reporters on the ground.

The protesters also targeted the police personnel deployed to control the situation, raising slogans of "Tis Hazari, Tis Hazari" and "Vakilo ko bulao" (call the lawyers), in a reference to the police-lawyer clashes at the Tis Hazari court complex last week.

Note: This piece wrongly carried an image of Mr Nadeem Khan implying him to be a protestor on behalf of JNU when he was not. The image has now been replaced and the error is regretted.

(This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text. Only the headline has been changed.)