AGENCIES
New Delhi: Around 150 students on Saturday embarked on their journey from here to Srinagar to show solidarity with the outstation students at the National Institute of Technology (NIT) in Jammu and Kashmir, following the unrest at the institute.
Holding the national flags, students from 12 states assembled in Delhi for ‘Chalo NIT’ march. They later began their journey to Srinagar on bikes, cars and buses.
In a late evening interview to a regional television channel on Friday, the Chief Minister described the NIT Srinagar developments as a “non-issue being highlighted by certain people as a communal incident”.
Mehbooba also said she had conveyed the same to the Union Human Resource Development Minister Smriti Irani when she spoke to her on the development.
She also said “a handful of non-local students were keen to migrate to other colleges outside the state”.
The Chief Minister “appreciated” the statement made by hardline separatist leader Syed Ali Geelani who had appealed locals to protect non-local students and ensure calm in the NIT.
Meanwhile, the over five-hour long marathon talks between the state Deputy Chief Minister Nirmal Singh and representatives of protesting non-local students remained inconclusive resulting in the continuation of the deadlock.
Singh held talks with seven representatives of non-local students along with state Education Minister Naeem Akhtar, a three-member team of Union HRD Ministry, director of NIT Srinagar and senior civil and police officers at his official residence in Srinagar.
Singh said most of the demands of the agitating students had been accepted and were told that shifting of the NIT outside the Valley “was out of the question”.