At least 250 students were arrested on Thursday in Rawalpindi for violence during protests against an alleged on-campus rape in a Lahore college as the agitation spread to other cities of Punjab province in Pakistan.
The protests erupted on Monday in at least four boys’ and girls’ campuses of the privately-owned Punjab Group of Colleges following social media reports that a female student at the Gulberg girls’ campus in Lahore had allegedly been raped by a security guard in the institution’s basement.
The police claimed they have the suspect in custody, but he has denied the allegation.
Punjab chief minister Maryam Nawaz has blamed jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party for spreading fake news on social media and said that no such incident had taken place.
On Wednesday, a large number of students held demonstrations in Jehlum, Faisalabad, and Gujrat, demanding justice for the alleged rape victim.
On Thursday, protests spread to Lahore, Rawalpindi, Gujrat, Attock, Sargodha, and Vehari districts of Punjab.
The student protesters ransacked a college building in Rawalpindi, forcing police to fire tear gas to disperse them. Later, 250 students were taken into custody, the police said.
