The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) on Friday expressed its concern over the FIR registered by Jamshoro police against nearly 100 Sindh University (SU) students allegedly involved in a clash with cops on Tuesday. On March 4, the Jamshoro police baton-charged and lobbed teargas shells to disperse students protesting against Cholistan canal and other water channels being created to irrigation millions of acres of Panjab lands with Indus water. The FIR was registered on Wednesday against the students, 37 of whom are activists of student wings of different nationalist groups. Many of the booked suspects were rounded up soon after a complaint against them was lodged by Superintendent Saleem Panhwar following the clash. However, they were set free after negotiations between Jamshoro SSP Zafar Siddique and some senior leaders of the political and nationalist parties that participated in a March 4 event at the university on the controversial canals issue. On Friday, the HRCP expressed its concern over the FIR and “deplore[d] the use of disproportionate force” against the protesters, after the police attempted to prevent them from gathering on the Indus Highway. “We remind the Sindh government that under international best practices, nonviolent assemblies that obstruct public roads should not be dispersed with force solely on the basis of the disruption they cause,” the human rights organisation said “The FIR must be withdrawn and those still in custody released.” The March 4 event at the SU was organised by certain nationalist parties, including Jeay Sindh Qaumi Mahaz (JSQM) and its student wing, to pay tribute to those Sindhi students who had participated in the movement launched on March 4, 1967 against ‘One Unit’. The event featured a march from the SU campus to the nearby section of the Indus Highway. However, strong contingents of police deployed along the route of the march tried to stop several hundred male and female students, as well as activists of the participating nationalist parties, from heading towards the highway. This led to a clash between the two sides and police had to lob teargas shells and apply baton charge to disperse the marchers. The participants reacted to the police action by pelting police and their mobile vans with stones, causing injuries to some policemen and damage to at least two police vehicles.