Clashes broke out at the Banaras Hindu University (BHU) on Saturday night, after police lathicharge on protesting students against alleged victim shaming by BHU administration.
The lathicharge happened hours after Prime Minister Narendra Modi completed his two-day visit to Varanasi and left for New Delhi.
The police allegedly did not even spare girls.Students claimed the girls were beaten and abused during the lathicharge by male cops inside the campus.As per the reports, four people including 1 female student and 3 male students were left injured in the incident.
The cause of protest inside the BHU is an incident of molestation faced by a First-year Fine Arts student of BHU who alleged that she was molested by three bike-borne men outside the University campus on Thursday evening.
The victim claimed that she went to the university administration for complaining about the incident but the administration in lieu of taking any action against the molesters,shamed the victim for her awkward hostel timings.
A friend of the victim told Quint “They even tried to put their hands under her kurta. Aghast, she went to the proctor‚Äôs office to complain against the misconduct of the men. The proctor, in turn, went on to question her credibility. She was told that it was wrong for her ‚Äúto be out at 6 pm.‚Äù
The students were protesting since three days against the failure of the administration to act against the attackers.The Students had sent a list of demanded to the VC Girish Chandra Tripathi Of BHU which included
1.Strict action against those in molestation cases.
2.Curfew be removed.
3.Employ female guards on campus.
There are mixed reactions coming out from university officials and protesters,BHU public relation officer Rajesh Singh said that protest is “politically motivated protest” further he said 80 percent of the protester are outsider, the crackdown came after the students intensified the protest and within few hours of Prime Minister Narendra Modi ending his two-day visit to Varanasi, his Lok Sabha constituency.
Today on September 24,in a press conference VC Tripathi said that “Boys from outside are creating rumpus in the campus,the pained student has no problem with BHU.We are willing to take effective action and we did it too.”But he said nothing about the action to be taken against accused and about the lathicharged by the police on students.
BHU is suspended upto October 2 due to erupted violence.
Several hashtags like #Abki_Bar_Beti_Par_War and #UnsafeBHU #SaveBHU are trending on Social media with several pictures and videos of the lathicharge.
But this incident has left 2 major questions in the mind of students and parents : Are our students (especially women students) safe in our campuses and our protests not allowed by students in the campuses? 
