Tiranga yatra triggers row at AMU

Aligarh Muslim University has served a show-cause notice to a student leader over a 'tiranga yatra' through the campus, saying it was held without permission and triggering a row.

The university said it followed procedure and believed that the motorcycle procession was meant to polarise students on the campus.

But the leader from the BJP's student wing alleged bias and said he would complain to the Human Resource Development Ministry.

Bharatiya Janata Party spokesperson G V L Narasimha Rao also criticised the University's stand.

Ajay Singh, a grandson of BJP MLA Dalveer Singh, was served notice Wednesday for the procession taken out a day earlier.

The participants said the tricolour procession', which began from the campus gates and ended at the sports ground, was part of the Republic Day celebrations.

The notice sent by AMU proctor Mohsin Khan said the procession was held during working hours hours after compelling students to leave their classes.

It added that a large number of "outsiders", including anti-social elements participated in it.

The proctor said the AMU has made it mandatory to seek official permission for any procession as a precautionary step to maintain peace on the campus.

An AMU spokesman said the university is holding a week-long celebration to mark Republic day.

But Ajay Singh's motorcycle procession was politically motivated and a ploy to polarise the student community under the garb of a so-called tiranga yatra," he said.

The Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Morcha (ABVP) leader, however, alleged that the AMU authorities had no objections when students raised slogans against the killing of a Kashmiri terrorist or protested against reservation for the economically weaker sections in government jobs and educational institutes.

"But they have a problem when we take out a 'tiranga rally' with slogans like Bharat Mata ki Jai, Singh charged.

The AMU was shaken by a controversy last year over a picture of Pakistan founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah, displayed on the walls of the student union office.

The university had then said Jinnah's portrait had been put up there along with those of others who had been granted life membership of the union.