150 held as Pakistani police clash with students protesting alleged student rape

ISLAMABAD

Some 150 students were arrested on Thursday during violent protests and clashes with police in several cities across northeastern Punjab province over an alleged rape of a girl student at a private college in Lahore, the provincial capital.

Over 150 students were arrested during clashes with police on Thursday, and several others were injured in heavy tear gas shelling in Rawalpindi, a garrison city near the country's capital Islamabad.

"We have arrested over 150 students so far and the process of identification still continues to arrest all those students who are involved in vandalism," Rawalpindi Police said on X.

Police also requested that parents stop their children from participating in violent protests.

Thousands of students took to the streets in Punjab cities such as Lahore, Jhelum, Rawalpindi, Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Lala Musa, Kharian, and Gujrat, where a security guard of a private college was killed during the violent protest.

At least 185 people in Gujarat have been charged with murder on Wednesday.

Students earlier protested in Lahore against the alleged rape incident at the private college last week. However, it turned violent on Thursday, a day after Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz dismissed rape reports as propaganda.

"There is no truth in this report that any girl was raped in any college. It is false propaganda," she told reporters in Lahore on Wednesday.

Thousands of students gathered outside the private college where the alleged rape occurred early on Thursday morning in Lahore. The enraged students set fire to the parking lot, shattered the windows, and damaged the doors.

More than 450 people have been charged in cases involving attacks and damage to campuses of the same private college in Lahore, Lala Musa, and Kharian.

The Punjab chief minister also ordered the arrest of everyone who spread false news on social media and encouraged students to protest.

Videos on social media showed police using heavy tear gas and batons to disperse a large student rally, while students threw rocks at riot police.

So far, dozens of students have been injured in ongoing protests in various cities across Punjab province.