A guard checks identity cards of students after violent clashes broke out between rival students’ unions at Siliguri College of Commerce. A Telegraph picture

Siliguri, Jan. 7: A clash broke out between rival students’ unions at Siliguri College of Commerce in the run-up to elections scheduled for Friday.

Kunal Guha, a second year student and a Trinamul Chhatra Parishad (TMCP) candidate, was injured when alleged Students Federation of India (SFI) activists attacked him with a bhojali. He was admitted to the Siliguri subdivisional hospital with gashes in the head.

A complaint was lodged with the police but no one was arrested till late evening.

The TMCP threatened to call an indefinite strike if the attackers were not arrested by tomorrow.

“We have given the names of the attackers to the additional superintendent of police. If the police do not arrest the attackers by tomorrow, we will go on an indefinite strike,” said Madan Bhattacharya, TMCP’s north Bengal convenor.

The SFI, which controls most of the college unions in the region but is in a minority in the Siliguri College of Commerce, denied that its supporters had attacked Guha. It blamed the assault on TMCP’s internal rivalry.

“We do not believe in violence in student politics,” said Shankar Ghosh, SFI’s state vice-president. The attack on the student followed repeated clashes between the rival unions at the college last evening.

Yesterday was the last date for filing nominations for the elections. Four students were detained following last evening’s clashes. A police picket was also posted at the college.

Guha said SFI goons attacked him with a dagger when he was going for a door-to-door campaign. Students in Siliguri campaign for college elections both on-and-off-campus.

“I was riding a motorcyle, down a street behind Deenabandhu Mancha, when a group of SFI members stopped me. They attacked me with bhojalis,” the student said.

Both the TMCP and Chattra Parishad (CP) accused the SFI of trying to disrupt the forthcoming elections.

Sanjay Prasad, general secretary of the CP-dominated students’ union, said:

“We have been dominating the college union since 1984. SFI knows we are going to win this time, so it is trying to terrorise our candidates and the voters.”

Bhattacharya said SFI was “taking law into its own hands” as it had the “support” of the ruling party. The SFI leader denied the allegations saying both CP and TMCP were trying to “scare away” their candidates.

Siliguri additional superintendent of police Rajeev Mishra said police would make all arrangements to ensure peaceful voting at the college on Friday.