Three more students arrested for Ekamra College violence

OST Bureau

Bhubaneswar, Oct 2:

Three more students were arrested by the Airfield police on Wednesday in connection with the Ekamra College poll violence on Tuesday.

They were identified as Purnendu Pujapanda, Bidyadhar Samantray and Radhamohan Nayak. With today’s arrests, the number of students arrested for violence in the college campus has risen to six.

Three students – Abhinash Mohapatra, Rakesh Parida and Kaushik Patra – were arrested by the police in connection with the violence in the college campus on Tuesday. They were all Plus III students of the college. All six arrested so far were forwarded to the court today, police said.

Inspector-in-charge of Airfield police station Rashmi Ranjan Sahu said they were arrested on charges of rioting, ransacking college campus, vandalism and attacking the police and booked under sections 147, 148, 149, 323, 341,436, 506, 307, 332, 333, 435 of the IPC in two different cases filed by the college authorities and police respectively. Warrants had been issued against 25 other students, he said.

Ekamra College was closed sine die and students’ union polls cancelled after a group of students, angry over the rejection of the nomination papers of two presidential candidates, ransacked the office, classrooms and laboratory equipment of the college on Tuesday. Later the violent mob set two rooms on fire and even clashed with the police.

Five students, along with three policemen, were injured in the clash.