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    JNU violence: Delhi Police questions JNUSU president Ghosh, two others

    Synopsis

    They said the three students, Pankaj Mishra, Vasker Vijay Mech and Ghosh, were questioned by the crime branch officers. They said that three other students -- Akshat Awasthi, Rohit Shah and Komal Sharma -- were absconding. Awasthi and Shah, who are first-year students of JNU, had featured in a sting operation conducted by a TV news channel.

    Aishe-Ghosh-PTIPTI
    Ghosh was questioned in Teflas which houses the students' union office.
    NEW DELHI: A team of Delhi Police's Crime Branch visited the Jawaharlal Nehru University on Monday and questioned three students, including JNUSU president Aishe Ghosh, in connection with the January 5 violence on the campus, officials said.

    They said the three students, Pankaj Mishra, Vasker Vijay Mech and Ghosh, were questioned by the crime branch officers.

    They said that three other students -- Akshat Awasthi, Rohit Shah and Komal Sharma -- were absconding. Awasthi and Shah, who are first-year students of JNU, had featured in a sting operation conducted by a TV news channel.

    The police had identified Sharma, a student of Daulat Ram College, as the masked woman who was purportedly seen in the videos of violence shared on social media wearing a check shirt, a light blue scarf and was carrying a stick.

    Her phone was switched off since Saturday night. When police had contacted Awasthi and Shah, they said they will join the probe but their phones were later switched off.

    All the three have been sent notices to join the probe.

    According to the police, Mech and Mishra were questioned for nearly an hour and all three have assured cooperation with police in the probe.

    Ghosh was questioned in Teflas which houses the students' union office.

    "They sought my version of events. They asked about my complaint and told me to narrate what happened on January 5. I also asked why they did not register an FIR on the complaint filed by me," Ghosh said.

    "They have also taken my number and said they will interact with me on an informal basis. I told them that I have some evidence, including videos which I am currently making a list of and will submit it to them in a CD," she said.

    Pankaj Mishra, a MPhil student of School of Social Sciences, said he has submitted a six-page written statement to the police about his whereabouts.

    "I was asked where I hail from and what was I doing before joining JNU and where did I work," he said.

    Mishra was also asked about his whereabouts on January 3,4 and 5 when the violence unfolded.

    "They tried to make me comfortable. I told them that I am a common student and don't belong to either the left or the right. In my statement, I mentioned my whereabouts, how I landed in JNU and since when I have been studying here... I have appealed to Delhi Police for a fair probe and hope that a peaceful ambience is restored in the campus so that we can get back to our studies," he said.

    Mishra, Mech and Ghosh are among the nine suspects whose pictures were recently released by the police following the violence in which 35 students, including Ghosh, were injured.

    Last week, the Delhi Police claimed that the violence at JNU was a fallout of tensions brimming on the campus since January 1 over the registration process.

    Ghosh is among the seven suspects who are from Left-leaning student organisations. Two suspects -- Vikas Patel and Yogendra Bharadwaj -- are from the RSS-affiliated Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP).

    Dolan Samanta, Priya Ranjan, Sucheta Talukdar and Chunchun Kumar (an alumni) have also been named as suspects.

    While Talukdar will be questioned on Tuesday, Chunchun Kumar and Samanta will be questioned on Wednesday, the police said.

    Responding to a plea filed by JNU professors, the Delhi Police also informed the Delhi High Court that it has asked the JNU administration to preserve and hand over the CCTV footage of the violence, but it has not yet received any response from the university.

    The police said it has also written to WhatsApp to preserve data, including messages, pictures, videos and phone numbers of members, of two groups -- 'Unity Against Left' and 'Friends of RSS' -- on the social networking platform on which the attack was allegedly coordinated.

    The Forensic Science Laboratory team will visit the campus on Tuesday to retrieve data from the server since they are operational now.


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