Amartya Sen criticises police role in JNU attcks, says CAA must be quashed

Nobel laureate Amartya Sen on Wednesday rallied behind the JNU students who were attacked inside the campus and criticised the role of police in dealing with the violence saying there was a "big absence of justice in the matter".

Speaking to a Bengali TV news channel after reaching the city on Wednesday, Sen questioned how those who were beaten up by "masked outsiders" were named in the FIR lodged by the Delhi Police.

On the contentious Citizenship Amendment Act, Sen who has been vocal against the Narendra Modi government, said it should be scrapped.

The professor of economics and philosophy at Harvard University said, "Some outsiders came and tortured the students of the (Jawaharlal Nehru) University and indulged in lawlessness there. The University authorities could not stop it and even the police could not come on time.

"... They (police) have failed to nab anybody till date. I have heard that the cameras (CCTVs) were not working. I have also heard that there were some problems in their (police's) report and that's why that cannot be submitted. And instead an FIR was lodged against those who got beaten up.

"That there is a big absence of justice in this matter is very conspicuous," Sen said.

Violence had broken out at JNU on Sunday night as masked men armed with sticks and rods attacked students and teachers and damaged property in the campus, prompting the administration to call in police which conducted a flag march.

At least 28 people, including JNU Students' Union president Aishe Ghosh, were injured.

On the Citizenship Amendment Act, Sen said it should be scrapped and the Supreme Court should turn it down on grounds of it being unconstitutional.

"I think the CAA must be scrapped because it cannot be an Act ... That's the job of the Supreme Court to see whether what was passed in the Parliament can be legally attached to the Constitution," the Nobel laureate added.