On May 23, 2017, the students of Aligarh Muslim University organised a protest march on the campus to show their condolence to the seven people lynched in an interior village of Jharkhand. The objective of the students behind organising this protest was to demand justice for those killed in the Jharkhand village by the bloodthirsty goons.
It was 11 am in the morning when the protest was carried out from the university library canteen to the Bab-E-Syed gate of AMU. “Bharat sarkar, nyay karo,” (Indian government, give us justice), “Jharkhand ke katilon ko fansi do, fansi do,” (Hang the killers from Jharkhand) were some of the slogans shouted out by the students in angry voices throughout the protest.
On reaching the Bab-E-Syed gate, various national and regional media persons approached the students. The sub-divisional magistrate (SDM) of Aligarh was also present, along with the Proctorial team of AMU. Asad Usmani, a student of AMU, addressed the students, saying, “Today we are not safe even in our homes and this is because of the massive failure of the government authorities who are not taking any action and allowing the culprits to roam freely.”
Further, Mohammad Arsalan, another student, lamented the incompetence of the state machinery in the series of atrocious events which are taking place in the name of nationalism. From the Hashimpura custodial killings to Pehlu Khan and Mohammad Akhlaq‘s lynching, and now the killing of seven innocent Indians in the state of Jharkhand – these were the incidents named by him.
Calling off the protest, the students also presented a memorandum to the additional district magistrate (ADM) of the city, the proctor of AMU, and to the various media persons who were present there. The memorandum will be sent to the President of India, demanding punishment for those involved in the incident. The students present in the protest march were Ammar Ehsan, Asad Usmani, Saad Mohammad Khan, Mohammad Arsalan, Amit Kumar, Moazaam, Faizur Rehman, Mohd Altamash, Rizwan Khan, etc.