Panel that defeated ABVP in JNUSU polls being branded 'anti-nationals': NCP

The Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) on Saturday said that the panel body which defeated the Akhil Bharatiya Vidhyarthi Parishad (ABVP) in the students election of the Jawaharlal Nehru University are now being branded as 'anti-nationals', adding that they are behind the bars and are struggling to come out.

"JNU is a different university. I am seeing this institution since the last 30 years. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Akhil Bharatiya Vidhyarthi Parishad (ABVP), the Congress and few Maoist sympathisers are in that campus. The Maoist sympathisers are not more than two-three percent which is very less proportion in an institution where ten thousand students are studying. The panel which defeated the ABVP panel in student union elections is now branded as anti national and is behind the bars. They are still struggling to come out," NCP leader Sharad Pawar said.

There were posters which said to divide India. No one would support such a message. The police should investigate, but what the police did was a provocation for students to take law in their hands. It's a very complex issue. What is wrong in that if members of the Parliament meet JNU students in their campus?," he added.

Kanhaiya Kumar is among the six JNU students who have been accused of sedition over a controversial February 9 event that marked the anniversary of the hanging of terrorist Afzal Guru, and during which anti-India slogans were raised. He was attacked by lawyers at a lower court last week.

Five other students accused of sedition surfaced on campus on February 21 after being missing since February 12.

Two of them - Umar Khalid and Anirban Bhattacharya - surrendered at the university campus on Tuesday night after their request to surrender at a secret location was rejected by the High Court.

Another student, Ashutosh, joined the police probe on the event today. He is likely to be asked to identity who raised anti-national slogans at the event.