Vaikhari Aryat
SAVARI strongly condemns the police brutality on students and faculty, which included verbal threats of rape hurled at women students; the profiling of politically active students and the unpardonable ongoing acts of depriving access to food, water and communication. Hostel students have the additional burden of keeping their parents and families assured of their safety, we demand that this violent and disgraceful situation be immediately diffused and restore the democratic rights of the students and faculty of UoH.
This is a compilation of Vaikhari Aryat’s updates on the atrocious situation unfolding in UoH since yesterday. She is a research scholar at UoH, and is trying hard to get information out to the world about the extremely vulnerable situation the students have been forced into:
Just got news that those students who were busy with community cooking at North campus shop com got arrested by police! Police says it is a public place and we can’t cook there! About 51 students are arrested and counting! Looks like whoever walks into shop com gets arrested now! University has also blocked SBH debit cards issued by university along with food, water, electricity and internet! They are turning us prisoners inside our very own campus! This is no more a university campus! This is a Nazi camp!
Is anyone out there listening? Or are you guys waiting for our dead bodies to extend solidarity?
Regarding food in UoH:
I see some updates from people and social and cultural groups outside campus, offering food for UoH students. Thank you all for raising to the occasion. Sad reality is that, our movements are restricted by university authorities and cyberabad police at the moment. The nook and corner of the campus are invaded by police and administration has officially shut down all the gates to university except main gate. We are left with zero option to get out. Students from LH 3 reportedly ordered food from outside but police did not let the delivery guy inside campus. He had to go back with food. After about 24hrs of no food, we opened the mess ourselves, cleaned it and cooked food with whatever was available in store. We will continue to cook till our rations run out. After that, we have no idea what we are going to do.
Students at ladies hostel south mess and north mess, please come to south mess. Lunch is prepared for all by students themselves. Please let all your friends know.
(Students of South mess have cooked dinner for 300 or so students. They are running out of drinking water.)
Undeclared emergency is prevailing in UoH now. No food, no water, no electricity and no internet. Sangh administration, police and ABVP nexus do whatever they can to suppress all kinds of resistance. Media play their role by hiding reality and police brutality on students and painting nonviolent protesters as hooligans who tore apart VC’s lodge and poor sangh puppets! While there are students who are privileged enough to afford food from outside, there is a good majority of students who depend entirely on mess food. It is not because of the quality of the food. It is because that is the only thing some of us can afford. When you shut down dining halls and canteens which provide food for students at a subsidized rate, you are punishing a good majority of us for the offense of being unprivileged! Who the hell are you running this Nazi camp for by murdering students day by day?
I see sangh parivar administration, sangh police hooligans and ABVP students who betrays their own student community playing holi with our blood today!
JAC_UOH: STUDENTS AND PROFESSORS ARRESTED. THERE IS COMPLETE MEDIA BLACKOUT. WHERE ARE THEY?
Vaikhari asks: IS IT BECAUSE THIS IS UOH, NOT JNU? IS IT BECAUSE WE TALK ABOUT CASTE, NOT CLASS? OR IS IT BECAUSE YOU ARE A PARTY TO THE WHOLE CONSPIRACY TOO?
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University cut off our internet facility since forenoon. There’s no drinking water available in mess, no dining hall opened anymore and internet blackout too. This is going really well VC. You have got us starved, thirsty and alienated from reaching out to outside world! Around 30 students are arrested (we are yet to confirm the numbers even) and 3 faculty members are taken into custody along with them. Students say police were shouting ‘Muslims are terrorists’ while beating up students.
In other news, media people were busy reporting ‘vandalism by protesters’ that they didn’t find enough time to cover police hooligans beating up and molesting students and faculties alike! We condemn the malicious lie spread by media that protesters vandalized VC’s lodge. It was ABVP which barricaded VC’s lodge from rest of the students with furnitures and created unnecessary tensions shouting ‘bharat mata ki jai’ at us while protecting killer Appa Rao Podile. They were the ones who actually vandalized the place, thereby. Also, police did stop students who were filming their brutality, beat them up and even broke cameras. A police man in mufti was shouting rape threats at female students all the while beating them up.
Maturity police issues rape threats, makes racist and sexist comments at students and brutally attacks students and faculty members physically!
Police violence:
Male police brutally grabbed, molested, tossed and beat female students and faculties alike. Female faculties were grabbed by their hair and dragged into vans. Male students were swept inside the van and were beaten without mercy. When I ran after them questioning that, police harassed me. They asked where I am from and when I told them its none of their business, they made a pass on my skin tone and threatened to teach me how to behave and tried to chase me away. They were doing the same to other students. They were rounding up stranded students and started chasing them beating.. Many of us are in health center and some are moved outside. 3 vans of students are arrested by now.
Shame on you VC for facilitating this violence against your own students!
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We got hold of the ‘action plan’ email that was sent out to faculties regarding ‘smuggling’ the killer VC back inside university of Hyderabad without letting its students know. What a shameful story! This is so shameful that it is actually sounding funny! We are sitting at VC’s lodge lawns, while Prashant reads out VC’s press release which is another joke! (It will be uploaded soon in JAC’s page) We condemn the ridiculous statements he made in the press release. In between, for demanding to arrest the killer VC with regard to the case filed against him, police call us immature! They do not even have the wisdom to understand what we are demanding is as per the constitution of India and the constitution of university of Hyderabad which Appa Rao Podile is actually violating smile emoticon
Maturity police go back!
This university was functioning almost normally till the killer has returned! He is back to disrupt the academic activities of the entire campus now! We want the murderer out of the campus! We know he will try to avenge whoever protested against him and will try to destroy evidences.
Police are planning to move us from here meanwhile. We remain here still even if it means we remain without food or sleep!
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Non teaching staff has decided to play along with killer VC’s tunes. They declared they are striking against students. All the messes in UoH are closed now. We are all here. Professors started joining us. Heavy police force deployed all over. They might lathi charge any moment. Since we believe in constitution, we appeal the police to arrest killer Appa Rao against whom the case has been charged under SC/ST atrocities act. Library is also closed. We are going for strike till he is arrested!
VC chamchanahisahenge!
ABVP sharamkaro!
Killer VC down down!
#UoH#DalitLivesMatter
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Update, 11.14 am, March 24th.
Vaikhari Aryat: Students please spread word that drinking water is made available in ladies hostel south mess now. Also Wi-Fi and electricity got reinstated after 48hrs of blanket ban. We do not know if this is going to be stable. We got our mess workers back after 48hrs. South mess in ladies hostel is functioning now. I tried asking them why did they leave us in crisis yesterday. They did not answer and refused to meet our eyes. I am glad they are back with us and I know they did not abandon us in purpose. What can they do? Most of them are daily wage workers. The pressure on them is about their daily bread too. They are as much victims of this system as we are. They asked us how did we manage for 2 days. Well, we survived it together as that is the only resistance possible here at the moment.
Last night students cooked food in LH south mess for ladies hostel inmates with available provisions, which was not enough for students from 7 hostels. So some of us went to have dinner from community kitchen in Shop com. Police men were still there all over the place, roaming around, invading the space, looking for potential anti-national activities like, er burping? Sharing drinking water? Comforting fellow students who breaks down occasionally exhausted from the threat, angst and pressure? Pretending everything is OK to distressed parents over phone? Being a muslim? I don’t know what are they looking for to pick one of us and beat up brutally like they did with Uday Bhanu, who did nothing other than cooking for hungry fellow students in the community kitchen earlier that day. As I sat there eating the humble dal and rice, with the campus community, I felt reassured that we will survive this ordeal. We will. Together.
Some students from community kitchen recounted yesterday, how the police stopped each box of tomatoes to check if we are bringing in beef to cook. Yes, they should be afraid. This is UoH, which talks loudly about beef politics to rest of the nation. I am glad they are scared. They should be.
Uday Bhanu is in ICU. We remain locked up inside. Outsiders are all blocked from entering inside this island and funnily that rule doesn’t apply to police. Police outnumbers students, invading our democratic space and othering us from our own space. Rohith’s mother and brother are sitting in front of the locked main gate since last night demanding the arrest of one of the killer’s of her son and his brother. Our friends and professors who got arrested from campus 2 days back still remain unreleased and false cases are charged against them. The police could not wait to file cases against the nonviolent protesters who had nothing to defend themselves from the violence of armed police. No mention about the policemen who threatened female students of rape and shouted muslims are terrorists! No mention about student who got kicked to lower abdomen till he vomited. No one is held accountable for the brutal sexual and physical violence on unsuspecting students and faculties alike! And yet, they can not do a thing to VC Appa Rao against whom the case is booked under SC/ST atrocities act and for abetting suicide of one of his own students. He resumes his power and order violence against his own students and colleagues so that he can avenge the resistance against his regime!
No, this campus is not back to normalcy yet.
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Images courtesy: Facebook.
