Protests erupted at the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IIT Madras) on Tuesday night as a group of students demanded action against those who allegedly assaulted a PhD scholar for taking part in a beef fest held on the campus on Sunday.

With police deployed in front of the IIT campus, students protested at the main gate and raised slogans against the Centre’s controversial notification prohibiting the sale of cattle, including buffaloes, for slaughter at livestock markets.

Various student organisations, including the Democratic Youth Federation of India, have planned a protest at IIT Madras on Wednesday.

On Sunday, about 80 students gathered two days ago to discuss the Centre’s order and ate beef in protest.. Later, R. Sooraj, a PhD student of aerospace engineering at the college, who took part in the beef fest was allegedly attacked by a few students from the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP).

Sooraj, who is a member of the Ambedkar Periyar Study Circle (APSC), was injured in his right eye and hospitalized. Manish Kumar Singh, a postgraduate student in ocean engineering and a member of the ABVP who allegedly attacked Sooraj had fractured his right hand, reported the Times of India.

Kerala chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan condemned the attack on Sooraj, “a Malayali PhD student”, for participating in the beef fest. A Facebook post from the chief minister’s office said: “It is unfortunate that a young man’s eye has been thrashed for merely eating beef. Our constitution gives us the right to consume whatever food we like to. Intolerance towards it is in fact intolerance towards our constitution itself. Will request the chief minister of Tamil Nadu to take necessary action in this incident.”

MK Stalin of Tamil Nadu’s main opposition party the DMK, led about 300 workers in a protest against the Centre’s order and courted arrest this morning in Chennai.

After West Bengal and Kerala, Tripura’s Left government has said it will not implement the Centre’s new cattle trade and slaughter rules, describing them as ‘anti-people’.

Meghalaya’s Congress Chief Minister Mukul Sangma has accused the Centre of “usurping the powers of parliament and a complete misuse of the law.” The BJP’s ally in the state, the National People’s Party has written to the Prime Minister  Narendra Modi asking him not to sign off on the new rules. There have been protests in several states.