Hyderabad:
Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi will spend Friday night with protesting students on the Hyderabad Central University campus. Mr Gandhi, who is in the city, will reach the university late in the night to join students who launched an agitation after the death of Dalit scholar Rohith Vemula.
It is Mr Vemula's birthday on Saturday. He would have turned 27. Students of the Joint Action Committee formed to steer the protests will take out a candle light march on the campus at midnight that Mr Gandhi will join. He had earlier gone to Hyderabad on January 18, a day after Mr Vemula was found hanging in a hostel room, and met the research scholar's family and companions.
Union Minister Bandaru Dattatreya was named in a police case registered after Mr Vemula's death. He was accused of writing to Education Minister Smriti Irani and seeking action against the research scholar and his companions for "anti-national activities." The university suspended Mr Vemula and his four companions for allegedly assaulting an ABVP leader in August last year.
The university campus has been a hotbed of protests since Mr Vemula's death, with students on a relay hunger strike to demand the resignation of Vice Chancellor P Appa Rao, who has gone on indefinite leave, and passing a "Rohith Act" to prevent suicides of ST, SC, BC and minority students in universities.
Earlier this week, the university said Prof Rao will be on leave and Vipin Srivastava, the senior most professor, shall perform the duties of the vice-chancellor. It did not mention the period of leave. The university's decision to have Prof Srivastava officiate in place of Prof Rao had triggered fresh protests.
The SC/ST Faculty Forum and SC/ST Officers Forum had expressed "shock" over the decision to appoint Prof Srivastava as officiating Vice-Chancellor and alleged that he headed the Executive Council Sub-Committee "which has been responsible for the death of Rohith."