Three male students of a government college located in Bhanpura, under the Garoth region of Mandsaur district, have been arrested allegedly for recording female students while they were changing clothes after a youth festival on campus. The arrested people include a local leader of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), affiliated with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
Police said that the CCTV footage allegedly shows men identified as Umesh Joshi, Ajay Gaud, and Himanshu Bairagi sneaking in and taking photos and videos of the female students, who were seemingly changing their attire in the changing room. Joshi, who was a city secretary of the ABVP, as reported by the Indian Express, was removed from the post after the incident.
The incident, which took place on Tuesday, was highlighted when the acting principal of the college got cognizance of the suspension activity and informed the police.
Meanwhile, ABVP’s National Minister Ms. Shalini Verma said in a press note accessed by the FoEJ Meida, “The Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) had already brought forth the factual truth. ABVP promptly took cognizance of the incident, investigated the reality of the situation, and revealed the facts. The police, too, acted immediately and clarified during their preliminary investigation that no objectionable video or image was found; this was communicated to the media by the police on the very first day of the incident.”
“ABVP believes that the principal’s act of publicly releasing CCTV footage without hearing both sides clearly reveals a sense of bias stemming from previous student movements. Moreover, this act is an attempt to tarnish the image of the institution,” she added.
“During the program, a few activists noticed a fan running inside the college canteen room and, out of suspicion, peeked inside—because earlier as well, some suspicious activities had come to light within the college which ABVP activists had opposed. This simple act of suspicion was misrepresented by some individuals, although the said room was not a “Girls’ Common Room” of any kind,” Shalini Verma said.
However, the police said, and the Indian Express quoted, “The CCTV footage clearly shows four boys peeping through the window. Following this, a case was registered. Three of the accused have been arrested, while the fourth is missing. Mobile phones of the arrested students have been seized for forensic examination.”
