HYDERABAD, Nov 12: A group of Sindh University students staged a sit-in outside the international hostel on Friday night and Saturday following the arrest of a student and Pakistan People’s Party (SB) activist.

The PPP-SB activist, Mohammad Ali Mirjat, was earlier arrested on the complaint of three students, Aftab Ali, Amir Ali and Ghulam Murtaza, to the university administration and later to the Jamshoro police that Mirjat, Zeeshan Lashari, Mohsin Jalbani, Asad Umrani and Asad Chajro had forcibly occupied their hostel room and ejected them.

The complainant, Amir Ali, also nominated 15 other unidentified students in the case which was lodged vide crime no 150/2003 u/s 147, 148, 149, 506 PPC.

Responding to the complaint, the police on Friday arrested Mirjat whereas his friends managed to flee.

In protest, around 150 students came out of their hostels and staged a sit-in outside the hostel where the complainants had their room. They also smashed the windowpanes of the hostel.

SU student affairs director Saleh Rajar, Additional DPO Jamshed Kazi and hostel provost Mohammad Siddiqi Kalhoro held negotiations with the protesting students who were demanding the release of Mirjat and raising slogans against the university administration and the police.

Kazi told the students that since an FIR had been lodged, Mirjat could not be released unless the complainant dropped the charges.

The PPP-SB activists also staged a sit-in on Saturday, demanding the release of Mirjat.

Later, local PPP-SB leader, Ali Gohar Chandio, talked to his fellow activists and managed to persuade them to end the protest.

Later, the additional DPO told this correspondent that the two sides had settled the dispute and the complainant had expressed his willingness to withdraw the FIR.

He said that the university had, however, decided to take disciplinary action against the students involved in the matter.