The Government College, Karyavattom in Thuruvananthapuram has suspended seven students on the charge of illegally detaining and assaulting fellow undergraduate students on the campus.
The complainant, Abhishek, alleged that on February 11, 2025, senior students attacked him and his friend Bins Jose.
The Kazhakkuttam Police have registered a case against seven third-year students from Kariavattom.
Government College on charges of assaulting junior students. The accused—Alan, Velu, Anandan, Salman, Sravan, Pardhan, and Immanuel—have been booked under sections 189(2) (unlawful assembly), 191(2) (rioting), 190 (unlawful assembly with intent to commit a crime), 115(2) (voluntarily causing hurt), 191(3) (rioting with a deadly weapon), 126(2) (wrongful confinement) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).
According to the victim, the senior students intercepted him while he was walking with a friend and physically assaulted him without any provocation. His friend reportedly fled from the scene.
“They took me to the SFI unit room and forced me to kneel. They threatened to break my legs if I did not comply. When I asked for water, they spat in it before handing it over to me,” the victim told the media. The accused reportedly warned him against informing the college principal about the incident.
Meanwhile, another student, Bins Jose, a first-year biotechnology student at Karyavattom Government College, said on Tuesday that he was allegedly assaulted, harassed, and threatened by a group of seven senior students on February 11 on the campus.
Bins Jose said he has lodged a complaint with the police, and the college authorities on the day of the assault itself.
“The incident happened when I and my friend Abhishek were walking through the campus. Then a group of seniors stopped us and started beating me. My friend managed to run away from there and went to inform the principal,” he told media persons here on Tuesday.
The revelation comes a day which marks one year since the death of JS Sidharthan, a student of the College of Veterinary & Animal Sciences , Pookode in Wayanad, who was a victim of brutal ragging. Multiple attempts were made from the outset to derail the case, which names 18 accused, including SFI activists. The most recent development saw the Kerala High Court’s division bench intervening to prevent the accused from continuing their studies.
A preliminary inquiry by the college’s anti-ragging committee has reportedly confirmed the incident. The anti-ragging committee has verified the claims after examining CCTV footage and interviewing witnesses.
The incident follows another ragging case in Kottayam, where five senior nursing students at the Government Nursing College were arrested by the Gandhinagar police over similar allegations.
Kerala’s Higher Education Minister R. Bindu has said that a State-level anti-ragging mechanism would be instituted to address the growing concerns of ragging in educational institutions.
Speaking to media persons here on Tuesday the Minister condemned recent incidents of ragging and emphasised the need for stringent measures to curb such practices and protect students.
KPCC President K Sudhakaran has demanded that the SFI,the students’ wing of the CPI-M ,should be dissolved immediately as killing and massacring of classmates has become a common practice of the left students’ organization.
“How many atrocities have this organization committed in the one year since the killing of Siddharth, a student of Pookode Veterinary College? Most recently, SFI also soaked the Karyavattom campus in blood. First-year biotechnology student Bins Jose was beaten in the SFI’s beating room. It is repeatedly made clear that this is a cannibalistic movement,” Sudhakaran said
The incident at the Kottayam Government Nursing College was also a brutal incident of ragging, he said .” Those arrested are office bearers of the Left organization and SFI workers. But as usual, they are trying to evade by saying that they have no connection with the incident. The SFI, which is still justifying the beating of former Higher Education Council Vice Chairman TP Srinivasan, has the seeds of the murderous politics of the CPI- M in Kannur. The post-mortem report says that there are 19 serious injuries on Siddharth’s body. The government has protected the SFI members responsible for Siddharth’s death in terms of bail and further studies,” he said.
Sudhakaran also demanded that the role of the SFI in the spread of drugs on campuses be investigated.