Punjab Congress president Warring condemns brutal police lathi‑charge on PU students

Punjab Congress President Amarinder Singh Raja Warring today strongly condemned the brutal police lathi-charge on students who were staging a peaceful demonstration in support of their various demands.

He also took strong exception to the Haryana Police personnel roaming around in Mohali in an effort to block the protestors from reaching Chandigarh. “This is unacceptable, as they have breached the jurisdiction of Punjab,” he asserted.

In a statement issued here today, Warring referred to the “brutal use of force” by the Chandigarh Police, assisted by the Haryana Police, to prevent students from reaching the Panjab University campus.

The PCC president said that the Central Government, the Chandigarh administration and the Panjab University administration do not appear to understand the grave sensitivity of the situation.

“Don’t take it as a routine or a casual administrative matter,” Warring warned, while adding, “the people of Punjab have strong sentiments attached to Panjab University that go back to 19th century Lahore when it was founded there.” He said that first the Central Government took an unnecessary and uncalled-for measure to scrap the Senate and the Syndicate, and now it has been avoiding elections — and when students demanded a time-bound election schedule, they were brutally manhandled.

He expressed complete solidarity with the students seeking election schedule for the Senate. He said, this becomes all the more important since the BJP government at the Centre is known for going back and reneging on its promises.

“We not only support the students’ peaceful demonstration in support of their demand, we also seek a time-bound schedule for the announcement of the Panjab University Senate elections,” he added.

Referring to the media visuals of some Haryana cops being seen inside Punjab border in Mohali, Warring said, this is a breach of jurisdiction of the Punjab Police, which must be strongly resisted. He said, the Punjab government must lodge a formal protest with the Haryana government for this breach of territorial jurisdiction of Punjab.