Jharkhand witnessed an unfortunate night yesterday. #peektv

What happened in Jharkhand yesterday was absolutely shameful and it needs to be condemned without any comparison with Jantar Mantar on any sort of qualification. In the darkness of night, the police brutally lathi-charged protesters sitting outside the assembly gate and near the Vidhan Sabha and Ranchi. Many protesters and students I spoke to said that they were severely injured and the police beat them black and blue. So what exactly happened? Hundreds of protesters entered the Vidhan Sabha premises even though the police tried to stop their march by using lathis, tear gas and water cannons. So even after the Vidhan Sabha was adjourned, protesters said that they continue to sit outside the assembly hoping that the government would initiate some sort of a dialogue or there will be some communication from the government given the fact that thousands of people took to the streets yesterday. Protesters said that the police did not act till about 5pm, but as soon as it was dusk, according to eyewitness accounts, at least 1,200 to 1,500 cops and security personnel closed in and indiscriminately largely charged the protesters sitting peacefully outside the assembly gate. In fact, some protesters said that the cops not only manhandled the students, but also media personnel Many male police personnel also reportedly beat female protesters Now according to students who were present there the police chased the protesters away and some of the students actually had to run towards the fields that surround the Vidhan Sabha They said that because of the rain, the field was all muddy. Some of the protesters also say that the shoes are still stuck there. The fact that this kind of violence was unleashed on unarmed protesters and students is absolutely shameful. Even though in the afternoon, there were isolated incidents of tear gas and lathi charge, the police use brute force as soon as the sun sets. Rahul Gandhi in a press conference may have said that he condemns this violence. His statement seems tokenistic at best, because a government of which the Congress Party is a part used the coercive apparatus of the state on students who said they were absolutely helpless. Does this not reek of hypocrisy that in Parliament, you are demanding the Home Minister's resignation over the police brutality on July 20th and in Ranchi, your alliance government does exactly what you are condemning in Delhi? Having spent multiple days on ground in Jharkhand, I can tell you that these are students who marched yesterday for years of trauma and suffering at the hands of a corrupt system. And they deserved better.