Guwahati, May 25: As former militants disrupted rail and road traffic in Lower Assam this morning, student activists from the Bodo heartland got into scuffles with police in the state capital.

At least 20 people, including some policemen, were wounded when members of the All Bodo Students’ Union turned violent at Jalukbari and Amingaon. The students resorted to indiscriminate stone-pelting after the police stopped a convoy of more than 70 buses that was bringing them to the city for a rally.

The clash occurred around 11 am, when the roads were choked with vehicles. A police van and several private vehicles were damaged in the stone pelting.

Additional superintendent of police (headquarters) Bedanta Rajkhowa said a police team stopped the buses carrying Absu activists near Amingaon only to clear the way for chief minister Tarun Gogoi’s convoy, which was headed for the IIT campus in north Guwahati.

“We requested them to stop there for sometime as so many buses travelling in a row would have created traffic chaos in the city. The Absu members thought the police were preventing them from attending the rally at Sonaram playground and became violent,” the officer added.

Three policemen, including deputy superintendent (Pandu) Raj Mohan Das and the officer-in-charge of Jalukbari police outpost, R.K. Das, were among those injured in the melee. Some protesters and bystanders were also injured when the police used batons to disperse the mob.

Absu had organised the rally in support of various demands, one of which is reservation of the Kokrajhar parliamentary seat for Scheduled Tribes.

Absu leaders said the police fired in the air to sabotage the rally, but officials clarified that not a single shot was fired.

The police allowed 1,500-odd students to attend the rally after bringing the situation under control. Nobody was arrested for the arson.

Addressing the rally, Absu president Rwn Gwra Narzary opposed the draft proposal of the Delimitation Commission to dereserve Kokrajhar parliamentary seat.

“Prior to the constitution of Bodoland Territorial Area Districts, the Kokrajhar seat was reserved for Scheduled Tribes. Dereservation of this seat will curtail the right of the people of the area to be represented by one of their own in Parliament,” he said. The organisation later handed a memorandum to chief minister Tarun Gogoi.