Two days after student-activist Amulya Leona Noronha was arrested for raising pro-Pakistan slogans in Bengaluru, Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai on Saturday said all educational institutions have been asked to keep tabs on “anti-national” activities on their campuses.
Bommai is slated to meet the top police brass on Sunday to discuss the state’s law and order situation in the wake of protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA).
“Instances of “anti-national sloganeering” have risen,” Bommai claimed, warning both educational institutions and NGOs backing anti-CAA protests. “Going forward, wherever anti-national slogans are raised, the organisers of such events will be held responsible.”
Speaking to reporters on Saturday, Bommai alleged that “anti-national forces have joined hands with Opposition parties that are leading anti-CAA protests”.
“Wherever anti-CAA protests are happening, such statements are getting encouragement. We want to uproot all such anti-national forces,” said the Home Minister.
Alleging a larger conspiracy, he said certain forces were using students, youngsters and women for disrupting peace. “We are monitoring Facebook posts, organisers and the forces behind anti-CAA protests,” he said.
Bommai said educational institutions had been asked to report any “anti-national” incident on their campuses or hostels. “If any such incident takes place, the police should be informed immediately. If the educational institutions keep quiet even after knowing, action will be initiated against them,” Bommai said.
Schools and college campuses have invariably become involved in the anti-CAA movement.
In Bidar, a school was charged with sedition over a play students staged, while three Kashmiri students were booked at KLE College in Hubballi for allegedly raising pro-Pakistan slogans at their hostel. In Mysuru, a girl was booked for holding ‘Free Kashmir’ poster at the University of Mysore.
“Since these have been happening for some months now, universities have been asked to be vigilant,” Deputy Chief Minister C N Ashwath Narayan, who is also the higher education minister, said.
In the Hubballi case, Bommai said he had asked officials to send him the file to get exact details on who and why the students were released on a bond.
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