Protests again rock Hyderabad varsity

HYDERABAD, April 6: Protests both on and outside the campus rocked Hyderabad Central University (HCU) on Wednesday, demanding immediate removal of Vice Chancellor P. Appa Rao. Police arrested scores of activists of various students groups at the main gate as they tried to barge in to protest the continued ban on entry of activists, media and others in the campus. Raising slogans against the vice chancellor and central ministers Smriti Irani and Bandaru Dattatreya, the protestors climbed on to the gate. Holding banners and placards, the activists of SFI, PDSU and AIDSO sat in front of the main gate. Policemen were seen dragging protestors to waiting vans and taking them away. One of the placards read ‘recall Appa Rao’ and ‘sack Dattatreya sack Smriti Irani from cabinet’. The protest was in response to the ‘chalo HCU’ called by Joint Action Committee for Social Justice, an umbrella group of various students’ organisations to condemn police excesses on students and continued lockdown of the campus since Appa Rao’s return as vice chancellor. (IANS)