ABVP toughs give up
THE GROWING outrage against the death of Professor H S Sabharwal on Wednesday finally forced bigwigs of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) to surrender before the police. However, not a single person has yet been booked for the murder of the teacher.
THE GROWING outrage against the death of Professor H S Sabharwal on Wednesday finally forced bigwigs of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) to surrender before the police. However, not a single person has yet been booked for the murder of the teacher.
ABVP state president Shashiranjan Akela and organising secretary Vimal Tomar were produced before the court and then sent to Bheravgarh jail after their bail plea was rejected. They have been accused of rioting at Madhav College on Saturday — when Sabharwal died.
Tomar was shown on TV channels threatening Professor M L Nath. Chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan went ahead and declared the death an accident, not murder —never mind that the CID is yet to conclude its investigation. But the peon, Komal Singh Sengar, who forced the police to register a murder case came out with a different version. The academic, he said, was attacked by a mob of 25-30 and no one came forward to help him.
In particular, a bespectacled man in the crowd abused Sabharwal and instigated the others to attack him. “The man wearing glasses was hurling abuses and he said, this man is Sabharwal. Hit him,” Sengar said.
“There was a mob of at least 25-30. One of them kicked the scooter and he fell down after which the others pounced on him. By the time I reached the spot along with police they had all fled the scene,” he said.
No one came forward to help Sabharwal. “Neither the principal nor any student or official gave me a helping hand. When I lifted the professor (to take him to hospital), they disappeared from the scene”.
In Delhi, a cornered BJP distanced itself from the ABVP leaders blamed for the death of the professor, saying the guilty would be booked.
“No attempt is being made to defend anyone,” said BJP spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad. “We strongly condemn the killing and whosoever is found guilty should be punished as per the rule of law.”
21 Congressmen held: The police on Wednesday arrested 21 Congressmen for creating disturbance during the student body election at Madhav College. The arrested were produced in the court of Justice R S Madia.
The court rejected their bail plea and sent them to judicial remand. The leaders include Municipal Corporation Speaker Azad Yadav, Yogesh Sharma, Ravi Bhadoria, Arun Verma and others. Though principal L N Verma did not name anybody in his FIR, police identified the accused Congressmen on the basis of video footage.
CID investigation: Meanwhile, CID Inspector General M P Dwivedi, who has been entrusted the task of investigating Prof H S Sabharwal’s death by the Chief Minister, collected information from different people on Wednesday. He inspected the spot and talked to vendors who sit near the college gate where Sabharwal was assaulted. Findings of the team could, however, not be known, as the IG refused to divulge the details and said the report would be submitted to the government. Meanwhile, six days on, no accused in the murder case has been identified.