Controversial social media celebrity, Tarek Fatah, was beaten up by students from Punjab University after he reportedly called a Sikh student ‘Khalistani’ and referred to a Muslim student from Jammu and Kashmir as a ‘terrorist.’
He was invited there to deliver a TEDx talk on Balochistan when the fracas took place.
Gagandeep Singh Dhillon, a PhD scholar in geography, was quoted by Indian Express, “I was sitting at the physics canteen when Tarek came and began an informal interaction with students. We were discussing yesterday’s Nagrota terror attack. When he was talking to us, the department librarian came. When the students rose to show respect, Tarek told them, ‘Indians need to stop giving such treatment to their seniors’.”
Tarek reportedly added that he would not stand up for his own father, ‘why are you all standing up for this person’.
When Mustafa, a PhD scholar from Kargil, objected, he told him, “Hey you gori chamdi, where are you from?… You’re a Pakistani terrorist, you’re an anti-national.”
Tarek then allegedly told Dhillon, “You are a Khalistani.”
This led to angry students beating him up.
The situation became so intense that the organisers had to cancel his talk.