Former Delhi police commissioner Neeraj Kumar on Sunday said had he been in command of the force, he would have sought intelligence and intervened “at any appropriate time” to prevent the violence on the Jawaharlal Nehru University campus.

Kumar’s remark came amid widespread criticism of Delhi police for its delayed intervention during the January 5 violence in JNU when masked people armed with rods and sticks ran amok on the campus, assaulted students and faculty and vandalised property, leaving 34 injured.

“The administration kept seeing the situation and that was wrong. The police could have acted even without the VC’s request,” Kumar said.

“More importantly, the special branch and the local police, which was aware of how things were happening over the past few days, should have foreseen the events and based on its own reports it could have intervened,” he said.

Asked what would he have done differently had he been the police commissioner, the former top cop said: “I would have pressed my special branch into service and asked it to develop intelligence and at any appropriate time, I would have intervened and prevented the incident from happening and no one could have faulted me for that.”

Referring to the police assault on Jamia Millia Islamia students, Kumar said: “In Jamia, they did very well to intervene. (But) they were involved in excesses and that was kind of an overreaction.”