International Students Feels Unsafe in Goa after the Attack on Afghan Student near Goa University Campus

The Afghan student was attacked over a small altercation with the group of four accused it shows that the youth are moving around with the weapons like a knife in their possession and ready to attack anyone anytime. This needs to be dealt with seriously to avoid any such incidents from happening in the future. Following the stabbing of an Afghan student near the Goa University campus, the international student studying in Goa are feeling unsafe.      

According to the reports, the Afghan Student community in Goa is no longer feeling safe after the fellow Goa University (GU) student was stabbed by miscreants on Sunday after an altercation. On Tuesday, they labelled the incident a “hate crime”. 

The president of the Association of International Students studying at GU, Abdul Basit, who also an Afghan, said that they have not received any support, as expected, from the university after the incident of stabbing on the fellow student.

Basit demanded that the case should be investigated as an ‘attempt to murder’ as the knife had missed rupturing the victim, Matiullah Aria’s, kidney by just an inch. He said the vice-chancellor should pressurise police into expediting an inquiry. 

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According to sources, even the local students of Goa University have developed the feeling of fear amongst themselves as they mentioned that they too feel unsafe on campus now due to it not being an enclosed one. 

The injured student is among 30 others from Afghanistan studying at Goa University under the government of India’s Indian Council of Cultural Relationship (ICCR) programme, Basit said. “Until now, we had felt safe in Goa. But from now onwards, we do not know if it is safe or not. Better security of international students must be ensured. We were shocked to hear about the incident and do not feel secure. We feel what happened was a hate crime because Aria was asked by the accused where he is from, what he was doing there, how he could have a bike being an outsider and then he was stabbed,” said Basit. 

He added that though the crime did not take place on the GU campus, the incident occurred very close to the campus and the victim was verbally abused and assaulted as well before being stabbed. 

According to the reports, The victim’s friend, Mohammad Rahim, said Aria had gone alone to a ‘viewpoint’ in Dona Paula, very close to the GU campus, on his friend’s bike. When he was leaving the spot, Rahim’s bike slipped. Three men approached him and began bullying him. As the altercation heated up, Aria was stabbed.   

He is still recuperating in the ICU at a private hospital close to campus. “Goa University registrar Y V Reddy and in-charge of foreign students Rahul Tripathi met him in the hospital,” Rahim said. President of Goa University Postgraduate Students’ Union Sanmesh Shet said that initially only one accused was arrested by the police when four were involved. 

“Though we now believe that two more have been held, one is still to be arrested. If the inquiry is not expedited in the next two days, all university students will take a morcha to the police station. Goa University officials must pursue the case themselves with police. These students have come to Goa University from another country and we have to respect them and make them feel secure,” said Shet. 

Goa’s name is already spoiling on the tourism front with the growing number of rape and murder cases, harassment of the Tourists and with this case, Goa’s reputation in the education sector will also take a back seat. There is a need for taking strict action on such kind of incidents and save our Goa.