Identity of 'guy in red shirt' lathi-charging Jamia students remains murky: RSS volunteer, police constable or someone else?

Update: On Tuesday, it was reported that the man in the red shirt lathi-charging students of Jamia Millia Islamia could either by an RSS volunteer or a police constable. 

According to The Print, some people identified him as Bharat Sharma, an RSS volunteer and ABVP state executive committee member — something refuted by the Delhi Police. However, DCP (Central) MS Randhawa was quoted by the publication as saying that the man in question wasn't an RSS volunteer, but "in fact, a constable with the AATS in South district who was also deployed on the law and order duty in the area".  

As of now, his identity has yet to be confirmed

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Amid protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act all over the country, Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia on Sunday tweeted out two videos from his official handle.

The first video had visuals of tyres and vehicles burning on the road, near Jamia area as claimed by Sisodia in the tweet, while the police stand at guard and some try to quell the protests around. Sisodia tweeted: "BJP is setting fire in Delhi for fear of defeat in elections. The AAP is against violence of any kind. This is cheap politics of BJP. In this video, see how the fire is being set under the protection of the police." Firstpost could not independently verify the veracity of the video.

In a subsequent tweet, Sisodia also shared images which showed one man, dressed in a orange/red shirt with a helmet which hid his face, attacking protesters around him. Sisodia tweeted:

The tweet went viral pretty soon. Senior journalists and reporters, apart from the general public on Twitter, widely shared the tweet without really sharing any useful information on the unknown guy in the red shirt and the helmet. Sisodia further added: "There should be an unbiased investigation as to what these uniformed people are putting in the buses with yellow and white color cans before the buses start a fire ..? And at whose behest was this done? It is clearly seen in the photo that the BJP has started this fire from the police while doing cheap politics."

As the protests in Jamia got violent, unverified tweets, videos and images went viral on the micro-blogging site bringing back focus on the importance of containing fake news on social media. That aside, Twitterati widely shared the photo — at first some alleged that the guy in the red shirt was a "BJP goon" because he is wearing a orange/red shirt, but later tweets questioned the Delhi Police asking whether he was part of the Delhi Police team and why he was attacking Jamia students.

A group of Jamia Millia students stood shirtless in the bone-chilling cold outside the university gates on Monday to protest the police action against their colleagues a day earlier. Slogans of "inquilab zindabad" rent the air as the group of around 10 students, accompanied by their fellow colleagues, took out a small march, demanding a CBI inquiry into the "police brutality".

"Our colleagues have been beaten up badly. The policemen entered bathrooms, libraries and beat up girls. Our protest is against the goons called Delhi Police," said a research scholar who did not want to be identified. Meanwhile, The Supreme Court has agreed to hear on Tuesday pleas which have alleged police atrocities on students holding protests against the amended Citizenship Act at the Aligarh Muslim University and the Jamial Millia Islamia University.

A bench headed by Chief Justice SA Bobde on Monday also took serious note of the rioting and destruction of public property during protests against the Act and said this must stop immediately. A group of lawyers led by senior advocate Indira Jaising and Collin Gonsalves mentioned the matter before the court urging it to take suo motu cognisance of the alleged violence unleashed against students who are holding protest against the Act.

See the full video here: