Nashik/Mumbai, Jan 6 (IANS): Activists of Nationalist Congress Party and Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad clashed here prompting the local police to use force to separate and disperse them, here on Monday, officials said.
The incident happened when a large number of NCP activists staged a noisy protest outside the Nashik branch of ABVP - the youth wing of Bharatiya Janata Party - to condemn the Sunday's violence in the Jawaharlal Nehru University campus in New Delhi.
The NCP activists carrying the Indian Tricolour and party flags, raised loud slogans attacking the BJP and ABVP and holding them responsible for the JNU campus hooliganism which left around 35 students and professors injured.
Retaliating by shouting slogans, the ABVP activists and NCP workers soon got physical, pushing each other around and indulging in fisticuffs, leading to a tense situation.
The police, present in strength at the venue immediately intervened, forcibly separated them and dispersed them, and also rounded up a few activists.
This afternoon, Nationalist Youth Congress Party (NYCP) President Mehboob Shaikh and other activists staged a protest outside the BJP state party office in Nariman Point.
They waved banners and posters with photos of Mahatma Gandhi, Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, the National Tricolour and raised slogans against the BJP-ABVP, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah for yesterday's violence.
In Aurangabad, a group of NYCP attempted to storm the local BJP office but were thwarted by a large police posse present there.
In Mumbai, NCP senior leader and Housing Minister Dr. Jitendra Awhad joined a protest rally organised by various students unions, NGOs and collegians at the Gateway of India this afternoon.
Several protests are on in Mumbai, Pune, with more planned today in these cities and in Wardha's Mahatma Gandhi Antarrashtriya Hindi Vishwavidyalaya to condemn the JNU violence.