It is a bad time for university students in the country it seems. After HCU and JNU, the action now seems to have shifted to Patna University in Bihar. A video doing the rounds on social media since yesterday shows a burly guard in uniform running after students down a staircase of a building and shooting at them. He can also be heard abusing the students in the video. (Newslaundry has not been able to verify the authenticity of the video.)

The video was purportedly shot at the official residence Patna University’s Vice Chancellor Prof. YC Simhadri, inside Patna University. A conflict between students and authorities over the suspension of eight students seems to have led to the situation escalating. The eight students were suspended after they got into a fight with “goons” of a construction contractor. Students allege that the contractor had been stealing electricity from hostel power lines and was hired by university authorities. This incident took place on May 1, 2016. Two days after the incident, the Principal of the college, Chandrabhushan Srivastava, suspended eight students from the hostel on grounds of indiscipline.

The suspended students as well as one more student from the university have been on a hunger strike for the past 13 days, protesting against the suspension. On May 22, a few students were protesting outside the gate of the official residence of the VC and this was when things got out of hand. The VC’s guard, Parmanand Paswan, allegedly open fired at the students. “We were lathi-charged and when we tried to speak with the VC. The guard took out his gun and started shooting, targeting me and another student,” said Akash Kashyap, a political science student and a member of the Left-wing students’ organisation All India Students Association (AISA). According to Kashyap, the protesting students have been trying to talk to the VC, but their attempts to meet him have been in vain.

Patna University students have called for a protest rally against yesterday’s firing incident. It is believed that students of Patna Law College are boycotting their semester exams in protest. Newslaundry’s repeated attempts to get in touch with the college authorities did not yield a response.