KATHMANDU, DEC 24 - Amidst violent student demonstrations across the country, the government today filed sedition cases against the three student leaders at the Special Court. They were arrested on the charge of making defamatory remarks against the king and the crown prince during a mass demonstration of political parties last Tuesday.
The clashes between security personnel and students flared up on the sixth consecutive day of the student protests. Dozen of students were reported injured and several arrested nation-wide as security forces tried to interfere with the protesters who demanded the release of the detained student leaders Gururaj Ghimire, Gagan Thapa and Purushottam Acharya.
Meanwhile, a meeting of the alliance of the seven student organisations today said that they would be forced to announce their decisive agitation if the government did not withdraw the charges against their leaders and stopped suppressing the students’ movement.
In the chargesheets filed under Section 4 (1) of the State Offence Act 1989, government prosecutors have sought three years of imprisonment and Rs. 3,000 in fine each for their defamatory remarks. The hearing on whether the student leaders should be held or released will begin from tomorrow. The three student leaders submitted their depositions to the court officials. In their deposition, they were asked 11 questions about the charges labelled against them.
"I told the government prosecutors that I had chanted slogans for democratic rights and for a more honourable monarchy, not against the king and the crown prince," Gagan Thapa told The Kathmandu Post when asked what he said to the prosecutors.
As the legal proceedings were being held inside the Special Court at Anam Nagar, students were chanting slogans against the king and were demanding unconditional release of their leaders. Demonstrators also pelted stones at the vehicles belonging to the government prosecutors.
Defying the government ban, the students took out torch rallies from various campuses this morning. They burned tyres on the roads in the capital, stalling movement of traffic.
At the Ratna Rajya College, students snatched the batons and belts of the riot police and burnt them as the latter fired teargas to disperse the crowd. The police later stormed the campus, resorting to lathi-charge that left several students wounded, one seriously, in the melee.
Police raided Tri Chandra College and beat up students. Deepak Chhettri, a student, broke his leg after police pushed him off a three-story-tall college building, according to eyewitnesses. Later on Armed Police Force was mobilised to control the situation. However, the army was called on to disperse the students at the Saraswati Campus. The army fired four rounds in the air.
Similar protests were held in Tansen, Rajbiraj, Birgunj and Baglung. In Tansen, the police fired three rounds in the air to disperse the demonstrators.
Meanwhile, Nepali Congress (NC) President Girija Prasad Koirala today met the detained student leaders at the Hanuman Dhoka Police Office while NC general secretary Sushil Koirala met them at the Special Court.Posted on: 2003-12-25 05:21

Post Your Comment

Please note that all the fields marked * are mandatory.

* Full Name

* Address

* Email Address

* Comment
[Some of the HTML tags you can use : <b>, <i>, <a>]

* Captcha

Get another CAPTCHA code