Meghalaya: Conflict erupts between RSS & ABVP during Holi celebration in NEHU, several hospitalised

A fight broke out between members of the Students Union of North Eastern Hills University (NEHUSU), Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) during the Holi festival.

According to reports, the event happened on the university grounds about 12:30 PM. Vice President Easterson Sohtun of NEHUSU was hurt during the escalating altercation and had to be brought to the hospital.

Approximately two hundred RSS and ABVP activists entered the university with the goal of celebrating the Holi festival, according to Sohtun, who subsequently filed a FIR at Mawkynroh Outpost. Members of NEHUSU, however, halted them, claiming university policies that forbid political gatherings and festivities on campus.

The vice president of NEHUSU claimed in his FIR that he was assaulted by three people: Kamlesh Singh, Amit Tripathi, and Anubhav Pandey.

Members of the RSS and ABVP counter-alleged, shortly after the event was reported, that the NEHUSU vice president had deliberately interfered with the Holi celebration.

The claims made by the vice president of NEHUSU, according to ABVP state secretary Tengku M. Marak, were false and erroneous.

Marak said that when Sohtun arrived to forcibly end the Holi celebration on the NEHU campus, he did so with malicious intent. Marak continued by challenging Sohtun to present proof of the purported attack, adding that no one had attacked him or anybody else on their side.