Nearly six students were injured and two motorbikes burnt after a clash broke out between resident doctors and hostellers in Uttar Pradesh’s Banaras Hindu University campus over delay in allotting a bed to a patient, police said on Tuesday, 25 September.
The scuffle, which began at Sri Sunderlal Hospital, was initially between the patient’s family and resident doctors. Soon hostel students took the patient’s family’s side which led to the violence late on Monday night.
They began to throw stones at each other, hurled petrol bombs and injured each other in the campus, the police said. Some people set fire to two motorcycles and a police picket in the campus, the police said, adding that they also vandalised an ATM cubicle. A woman student on the condition of anonymity said, “The fight lasted all night, we knew a fight was going on but I didn’t step out.”
Senior police officials including SP Dinesh Kumar Singh rushed to the spot along with several policemen and used ‘mild force’ to bring the situation under control in the early hours of Tuesday. District Magistrate Surendra Singh and SSP Anand Kulkarni went to BHU on Tuesday morning.
A student said, “Boys from five hostels, Ruiya Hostel medical block, Ruiya Annexe, Dhanvantri, Birla and Lal Bahadur Shastri hostels have been asked to leave within 24 hours and all classes suspended till 28 September.”
A probe has been launched into the incident and one person has been detained, police said.
