NEW DELHI: Five students were injured, one serious with knife wounds, over a controversial beef festival organized by students of the Osmania University, located in the central Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. The organizers of the beef festival, mainly left wing students unions, were demanding beef as a part of their canteen menu, which has been opposed by Hindu right wing oriented students unions, who claimed that the cow is sacred to Hindu religion and culture. The violence in Osmania University later spread to the city, where a bus belonging to a state run government corporation was torched by the agitating students. It should be noted that these clashes erupted on Sunday night, after more than 200 students and teachers attended the festival and ate beef delicacies, to underline their demand for including beef, a cheaper meat in India as compared to chicken, mutton, etc, in the university hostel canteen menu as an affordable source of nutrition. “Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) activists (right wing students' party) were protesting at the festival venue but later clashed with the organizers and both parties started attacking each other with sticks and pelting stones,” a police official said, adding that tear gas shells had to be fired to disperse the crowd and bring order.
