The security presence outside Jamia Millia Islamia is sparser, but each entrance is guarded. There is a police warning and loudspeakers outside. Classes continue online. Inside, a sit-in that entered its 17th day on Wednesday has five students on hunger strike. Outside, students say all campus activities are nearly shut and even food and water are not being let in.

It was around the gates, on Monday evening, that Delhi Police detained three people: Niranjan KS, a member of the All India Revolutionary Students Organisation (AIRSO); Munna Qureshi, a Jamia student pursuing a certificate course in Yoga Studies; and Arbaaz Mewati, a Jamia alumnus now studying law at Delhi University. The next day, the Special Executive Magistrate court in Amar Colony sent all three to three days of judicial custody under kalandra proceedings, invoked under Sections 126 and 170 of the BNSS.

A kalandra is a police report outlining facts and circumstances that, in the police’s view, warrant preventive action by an Executive Magistrate. Unlike an FIR, which records information about an alleged criminal offence, it is intended to initiate preventive proceedings. 

While Mewati told Newslaundry that he was detained for trying to provide water to students inside the campus, police diary entries about the three men alleged that they were creating a disturbance and provoking people. Their lawyers have said that the SEM court did not take their arguments on record and that no clear reasons were given for sending them to judicial custody.

The demand to restore the Jamia Millia Islamia Students’ Union (JMISU), which has not held elections since 2005, has turned into a standoff. The administration issued a notification on Monday saying polls will be held within 15 days of approving the union’s constitution; but protesters want fixed dates for both. Students and lawyers now say the university and the police are using bans, notices, hostel pressure, cut-off access and detentions to curb dissent on campus. 

‘I was just trying to pass water to the students’

As he was being taken away in a police vehicle, Mewati told Newslaundry, “I was just trying to pass water to the students inside; they........

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