Male constables of Delhi Police hit and stomped on them, complain Jamia women in hospital

The students were stopped on Monday by police barricades when they wanted to march to the Parliament and lodge their protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act. The barricades did not come as a surprise but what followed has left many of them traumatised.

Fouzia, a final year student o Persian (Honours), is still in the hospital and told NH on Friday that while there were three or four women constables, male constables were the ones who assaulted the women and hit many of them in their private parts.

Hitting the students in their private parts seemed to be part of a well calibrated plan, as a boy suffered injuries on his scrotum and is also in the ICU. Several girl students seem to have contracted urinary infection and claim that the policemen had also sprayed some kind of chemical.

Male constables pushed and jostled with the women, pulled their scarves, kicked them and rained blows with their lathi.

Fouzia has bruises all over her legs and back. “Several parts of my body have turned blue.

“A policeman with a big built fell on top of me. I fainted and someone dragged me to the side. But, when I opened my eyes later, I saw that Iman and Rafiya were also injured.,” she recalled.

“They were abusing and taunting us all the while, wondering aloud why we were still alive, wishing us death. While we lay on the ground, they pulled out my shoes and began beating me,” recounts the student with a shudder.

Iman, also in the ICU, has internal injuries, confirmed doctors on duty. She had been bleeding for the past few days and is unable to sleep.

“A policeman pushed me from behind and as I stumbled, another policeman crushed my foot. The pain was unbearable. I think his shoes had nails or spikes or else I would not have been injured so severely. Another policeman pushed me on my stomach so violently that I started retching. Soon after I began to vomit blood,” recounted Iman.

Jamia Nagar resident Rafiya had climbed on top of one of the barricades to pull down two boys who were being assaulted by the police. While she managed to pull them down, she herself was left standing there alone.

She claims to have told the policemen that she would get down but a policewoman kept pulling at her shoes, making her fall in a heap. “She had pulled my dress up and had bared my midriff. I told her that people around were recording the scuffle and she should let me go. But she was past caring.”

“I fell at the feet of a policeman. He kicked me on my chest, my stomach and my private parts; even though I was screaming in pain, he did not stop. Then another policeman rushed forward and luckily dragged me away from him. I remember the good Samaritan telling me that I could have died if his colleague had kept stomping on me.

Rafiya’s medical report states that she has blunt injury in her chest, tenderness in her stomach, severe pain in her chest, vomiting and no sign of free fluids.

“I have a hairline fracture on my third and fourth rib. How can the police be so cruel? What are they taught during training?” said Rafiya with some difficulty.

The women still in hospital are all suffering from urinary infection. “Several of us have contracted urinary infection after February 10, in addition to there being puss in the urine. How is it that all of us have been infected,” questioned Rafiya.

The hospital confirmed that five students were still being treated till Friday evening. One of them was hit between his legs and his scrotum has been injured. Another sustained serious head injuries.