Three members of the National Students' Union of India (NSUI), the students’ wing of Congress party, submitted a petition to the Chikkaballapur police in Karnataka against a computer science engineering student from Kashmir’s Baramulla district, for supporting Pakistan in the India-Pakistan cricket match. The incident came after India lost to Pakistan in the T20 World Cup match on Sunday, October 24.
The NSUI had filed a police complaint on Wednesday, October 27, against a Kashmiri student in Karnataka’s Chikkaballapur district for his social media posts supporting Pakistan after India lost to Pakistan in the T20 World Cup series. However, the police have not filed an FIR (first information report) against the student so far.
Speaking to TNM, Chikkaballapur Superintendent of Police GK Mithun Kumar said, “The NSUI members had submitted a petition and we investigated the matter. However, we found that the student mentioned has not been in Chikkaballapur since March 2020. He is basically from Kashmir and probably might have gone back. He studied in Sri Jagadguru Chandrashekaranatha Swamiji Institute of Technology (SJCIT) for a year and he doesn't seem to have come back to Karnataka again. We don't know the whereabouts of the person. We are investigating the matter further.”
Speaking to TNM, Nasir Khuehami who is the spokesperson of the Jammu and Kashmir Students Association, expressed concerns over the police complaint and said that such incidents could have both short-term and long-term impacts on the students.
“NSUI filing a complaint is arbitrary and unacceptable. Supporting or cheering for a certain team in sports is not attached to politics or ideology. Cricket is unnecessarily being politicised by both right-wing and centrist parties. We didn't expect the Congress party to do this, just for cheering a team,” Nasir said.
“Games are actually bridges between nations. Hatred, bigotry and prejudice are against the spirit of sportsmanship. Games are entertainment and games like cricket actually teaches us brotherhood and harmony, not violence. Also, a cricket match cannot define someone’s identity and ideology,” he added.
According to a report in the Times of India, four Kashmiris, including a teacher and three students, were arrested in Uttar Pradesh’s Agra for sending Whatsapp messages celebrating Pakistan’s victory in the cricket match. The three Kashmiri students studying at an engineering college in Agra were also suspended for allegedly “posting status in favour of Pakistan,” after the match. In Rajasthan, a private school teacher was expelled for allegedly sharing a WhatsApp status with an image of Pakistani players, along with a caption that supposedly read “we won,” reported The Wire. More arrests were reportedly made in different parts of the country.