Cry for justice to Loitam Richard, Okram Laaba unabated
Source: Hueiyen News Service
Imphal, May 07 2012:
Protesting against brutal act of killing of Loitam Richard, a second semester engineering student in Acharya NRV School of Architecture, Bangalore and Okram Laaba, another Manipuri student studying in Hindustan College of Arts and Science, Chennai, thousands of students marched through Imphal and its peripheries today.
Responding to a joint call of five student's organizations namely AMSU, MSF, DESAM, KSA, SUK and SWAK, thousands of students coming from various schools participated in a protest rally which was kicked off from NCC ground, DM College campus this morning.
From DM College campus, the rallyists, holding placards and festoons inscribed with slogans like "Punish the culprits", "We Condemn discrimination of North East Students", "Stop Racial Discrimination", "We want Justice" etc, proceeded towards Lilasingh Khongnangkhong, Khongnang Ani Karak, North AOC, Khuyathong and Kanglapat Road with the intention of passing in front of Raj Bhavan on their way to Keishampat.
However, just as the rallyists reached the turning point to Gandhi Avenue, security personnel blocked them and prohibited them from going ahead.
The rallyists shouted slogans and tried to proceed further, thus resulting in a tussle between the agitated students and the security personnel.
Later, a City Police team led by OC RK Tejbir, Imphal West OC and DSP of Traffic Police Victoria landed at the spot with additional force and forced the rallyists to turn back towards Khuyathong.
The reluctant rallyists went back shouting slogans and when they reached Khuyathong turning point, they blocked the road and staged a demonstration, compelling the security personnel again to disperse them.
In the ensuing melee, six student protestors sustained injuries and they were taken to RIMS and JNIMS for treatment.
At last, the protestors assemble at Thangmeiband Thou Ground where a public meeting was convened.
After the meeting, some student representatives went to submit a memorandum to the Chief Minister.
However, they were not able to submit the memorandum since the Chief Minister was out of station.
Speaking to mediapersons in connection with today's protest rally, Pradip Kumar, President of KSA said that the act of the Manipur Police personnel in prohibiting the students from organizing the rally against the killing of Richard and Laaba was very unfortunate.
If the state government fails to take up steps to bring justice to the death, the five student organizations would be constraint to take up further course of agitations.