'Not right to brand all Kashmiri students anti-national': AIMPLB on AMU row

New Delhi, Oct 16: Amid row over holding a prayer meeting for slain terrorist Manan Bashir Wani in the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) campus, All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) on Tuesday (October 16) said that taking out Namaz-e-Janaja (funeral prayer) cannot be considered 'anti-national).

Kashmiri students studying at the AMU organised a protest march in the campus on Monday against slapping of sedition charges on their three peers for allegedly holding Namaz-e-Janaja for Manan Wani.

AIMPLB's Zafaryab Jilani

"When it comes to Aligarh Muslim University, BJP makes mountain out of a molehill. Students should be seen as students. If they make a mistake, it should be viewed as mistake by a student and that is what the University is doing," AIMPLB's Zafaryab Jilani told news agency ANI.

"Just because they were taking out Namaz-e-Janaja, they can't be considered anti-national. Maybe they were friends with Manan Wani. He was a student here. It can be an offence and police has registered case. It shouldn't be viewed as if all Kashmiri students are against nation," he added. (Image credit - ANI/Twitter)

Kashmiri students held silent protest

Earlier today (October 16), the students marched outside the varsity campus carrying placards, which read: ''Being a Kashmiri is not a crime.'' The students also pasted posters on the walls of the varsity demanding the withdrawal of the sedition case against three students and their suspension. (Image credit - ANI/Twitter)

Students carried placards

On Saturday, sedition cases were registered against the three students for allegedly raising "anti-India" slogans and trying to hold a prayer meeting for Hizbul Mujahideen commander Manan Bashir Wani, a aluminous of the varsity who was killed in an encounter with the security forces in north Kashmir. (Image credit - ANI/Twitter)

Jammu and Kashmir Governor Satya Pal Malik

Jammu and Kashmir Governor Satya Pal Malik on Tuesday spoke to Union Minister for Human Resource Development, Prakash Javadekar and sought his intervention to ensure smooth studies of the Kashmiri students at the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU).

Twenty-seven-year-old Wani, pursing a PhD course in Allied Geology at the AMU, had quit the university and joined militant ranks in January this year. He was killed in an encounter at Shatgund village in Handwara area of north Kashmir's Kupwara district on Thursday.