While disagreements over intellectual property are common in schools and colleges populated by competitive kids, one such skirmish turned ugly on Tuesday, when a 16-year-old FYJC student of SNDT University was allegedly beaten up by three female classmates and an unidentified boy outside the college campus, when she refused to give them her projects.

Sheela Nair (name changed) is a student in SNDT University in the Arts stream. According to he friends, she was ready with her all projects for FYJC that were due for submission over the past few days. She had already submitted her psychology project on Monday and was ready to submit her EVS and geography projects on Tuesday. During the afternoon break around 2 pm, three girls, all classmates of Sheela in the same college, approached her, demanding that she give them the projects that she was yet to submit. When she refused, they beat her up, claimed Sheela’s best friend.