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A Jadavpur Uni. Student Narrates How A Film Screening On Campus Suddenly Turned Violent

As told by Jubi Saha, an eye-witness and complainant, to Abhimanyu Singh:

Image posted by Sohel Jiggesshor Abu on Facebook.

On the evening of May 5, we came to know that a screening of the film, ‘Buddha In A Traffic Jam’, was scheduled for the next day. We had seen the trailer of the film and heard about it as well. We believe that the film denigrates the political opposition in the country, especially the Left forces. Moreover, both the director Vivek Agnihotri and one of the lead actors Anupam Kher have made statements against JNU students. However, he has a right to express his views and we respect that. Hence, instead of trying to stop the screening of his film, we decided to host a screening of the film ‘Muzaffarnagar Baaqi Hai’.

We did raise slogans and showed black flags, in a peaceful manner, to Agnihotri when he reached the campus. The screening of Agnihotri’s film was organised by a right-wing group and their members acted violently during and after the screening of the two films. They also molested female students and ten of us have lodged an FIR in this regard.

We managed to catch hold of four people from their group and kept them in the administration building so as to hand them over to the police. One of them is a faculty member at a college under Calcutta University.

Later, Roopa Ganguly, BJP leader, turned up at the site and her supporters indulged in vandalism. They asked us to hand over the right-wing activists guilty of violence to them. In all this, the police acted as mute spectators.

Finally, the Vice-Chancellor arrived and handed over the miscreants to the police which released them without registering any complaint.

They have also filed a counter FIR against us, naming, in particular, a tribal student, as being responsible for violence, along with others. This in itself is a testimony to their majoritarian bullying tactics.

Later on, we took out a march to protest against such acts of violence and molestation in the campus.

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