New Delhi: Kashmir remains on edge in the aftermath of a controversial social media post shared by a non-local student of the prestigious National Institute of Technology (NIT) in Srinagar, which had sparked protests earlier this week.
Authorities have closed NIT Srinagar in the middle of the semester and the students staying in hostels have been asked to vacate, purportedly to prevent further vitiation of communal tensions on campus due to the post which allegedly denigrated Mohammad (PBUH), Islam’s most-revered prophet.
“All students (boys and girls) are directed to leave the campus/ hostel by or before 10 am tomorrow,” said a notice issued by the dean, students welfare, NIT on November 30. The institute has also suspended mess service in the campus from Friday onwards.
The J&K administration has also asked other colleges in the region to shut down classrooms “due to early onset of winter” and shift their academic activities to the online mode only, with police apprehensive of law and order deterioration due to the allegedly blasphemous post.
In a hurriedly announced press conference on Thursday, November 30, Director General of Police R.R. Swain said that a case (FIR No.156/23) under Sections 295-A (insulting religion or religious beliefs), 153A (promoting enmity between religious groups) and 153 (provoking riots) of the Indian Penal Code has been registered at Nigeen police station on November 28.
Swain didn’t divulge information about whether the accused student, a resident of Maharashtra who had fled the campus after uploading the post, was arrested in the case. Without naming Pakistan, he, however, claimed that a conspiracy was being hatched “across the border” to use the prevailing anger in Kashmir for “other things”.
This story was originally published in thewire.in. Read the full story here .
