HYDERABAD: For a change, students of Nizam College upstaged Osmania University in making a point in the ongoing Telangana agitation by engaging hundreds of policemen in a veritable intifada just a stone’s throw from the police commissioner’s office on Monday.The trigger was a bid by the police to stop boarders of the Nizam College hostel from marching on their campus, just a hundred yards away, to express solidarity with their teachers who are on strike as part of the Telangana Sakala Janula Samme. With police already present in strength around the Police Commissioner’s Office opposite the college, a group of marchers set out from the hostel at 11.30 am. They were stopped by policemen who had commandeered a private vehicle. Thus invited to a riot, the students attacked the vehicle with stones, injuring some of the cops. The students then set upon other private vehicles on the road, and a free-for-all ensued.With reinforcements called in to block the march, students rained stones on policemen from the road opposite their hostel and also from within. Deputy commissioner of police (central zone) Akun Sabharwal entered the hostel with a battery of personnel and allegedly beat up the students inside.“It was merciless,” said one Nizam’s boarder. “Some of the students were in the bathrooms, they were dragged out and thrashed.’’ Sabharwal said his posse entered the hostel only to identify the stone-pelters. Nearly 30 students were arrested, he said.The thrashing attracted politicians like bees to a hive. Inside of an hour, MLAs Nagam Janardhan Reddy and K Harishwar Reddy were there and many Telangana advocates arrived as well. For some time, the MLAs hotly debated with the policemen how they could have dared to venture into the hostel without the permission of the principal.There was rioting too on the Osmania University campus. Nearly 200 TRS Vidyarthi Vibhag activists took out a rally from Arts College towards Secretariat but were prevented from venturing out of the campus at the NCC Gate. The students promised to be peaceful but the police took no chances. Tempers got stoked as student frontline stood eyeball to eyeball with the policemen. As is usual for OU riots, stones were slung from the rear and the familiar drama oft witnessed on campus played out. Police replied to the stones with tear gas shells, which scattered the rioters who now threw stones from all directions. Pressed, the police did enter the campus once to scatter the students with truncheons.The students reorganised, retreating from the NCC gate and making a stand deeper in the campus at the Ladies Hostel. Another engagement of stones ensued and continued into the afternoon.
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