When A Protest March Creates Ripple In Northeast India
By Nava Thakuria
01 March, 2016
Countercurrents.org
It was a usual protest demonstration, where thousands took part
chanting slogans against anti-national elements and marched on busy
streets of the virtual capital of northeast India. But aftershocks of
the Guwahati protest march elongated for weeks in the trouble-torn
region, where a section of media outlets even did not hesitate to play
the trick.
In fact, few thousand citizens joined in the protest rally braving the
morning sunshine on 27 February 2016 with the national flag in their
hands, which was kicked off from Dighalipukhuri point and culminated
at the same place after marching up to Chandmari locality of the
pre-historic city.
The Guwahatians devotedly responded to the call of Patriotic People’s
Front Assam (PPFA) for the protest march condemning the anti-national
advocates that emerged from different higher educational institutions
like Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Jadavpur University etc in the
recent past.
The protesters rubbished the section of JNU students for terming Afzal
Guru, who was executed for his involvement in 2001 Indian Parliament
attack, a martyr. The JNU students also showed the audacity to point
our the execution of Guru on 9 February 2013 as a judicial killing
and they even resolved to fight to break India into thousand parts
until it’s destruction is complete.
Those anti-India JNU students organized a meeting on 9 February
evening inside the JNU campus to commemorate the execution of Guru
even though he was executed after an exhausted judicial process. Later
they organized another commemorative meeting at Press Club of India
next day, where too anti-India slogans were raised. Similar news also
broke from Jadavpur University in West Bengal, where few students
indulged in anti-national sloganeering and poster-planting.
The JNU controversy has already gripped the huge public space in India
with international media attentions as the authority had arrested many
student leaders under the sedition charge. Numerous public rallies
were already organized in different parts of the country criticizing
Narendra Modi government’s handling of JNU issues. Even both the
houses of Indian Parliament debated over the matter, where the
opposition law-makers criticized the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led
government at the Centre for its ‘aggressive actions against
democratic exercises’.
Earlier, in another development the Union HRD minister Smriti Irani
initiated to raise the national flag in India’s 46 Central
Universities regularly. The vice-chancellors of these universities had
a meeting with the minister on 18 February and resolved in unanimous
that the national tri-colour would be flown prominently and proudly on
their campuses to signify a united India.
The PPFA, which is a forum of conscious individuals without any
political party alliance, hailed the initiative arguing that it would
help erasing the unwanted impression about the New Delhi based
prestigious institute that the JNU had virtually turned into a hotbed
for anti-India elements. Underlining the importance of elevating the
tri-colour, the forum pointed out that it symbolizes the immense
sacrifice made by millions of known & unknown freedom fighters to make
India an independent nation and every responsible citizen should
salute the national flag.
“It has been observed that separatist elements and a bunch of
so-called intellectuals of the country have long been opposing the
hoisting of tri-colour citing their grievances against the Union
government. They must understand that the national flag does not
belong to the government, rather it is owned by every Indian citizen,”
said Rupam Barua of PPFA.
The participants of Guwahati march chanted slogans like ‘Vande
Mataram, Joi Asom, Anti-Nationals Go Back, Down Down Anti-Nationals,
Punish JNU Anti-Nationals, Condemn Jadavpur Anti-Nationals, ‘RADICAL’
Get Out, China’s Bootlickers Get Out etc’.
The long march was led by a number of noted citizens, including
eminent journalist Dhirendra Nath Chakrabarty, noted publisher Giripad
Devchoudhury, retired bureaucrat Rohini Barua, award-winning
film-maker Manju Bora, ex-army officer Ranjan Dutta, film-critic Utpal
Datta, popular singer Babita Sarma, academician Jagadindra
Raychoudhury, publisher Dhiraj Goswami, physician Alekhya Barua,
environmentalist Soumyadeep Dutta, entrepreneur Ujjal Saikia etc.
It was also joined by popular writer Namrata Dutta, photography
director Jiban Dowka, councilor Sunita Bhiluwaria, social activists
Kailash Sarma, Pankaj Jalan, Kishor Saini, lawyers Chinmoy
Choudhury, Chinmoy Sarma Barua,Tapas Mishra, Bankim Sarma, Kumud
Konwar with senior journalists Biman Chandra Hazarika, Pramod Kalita,
Pradip Pareekh, DN Singh, Bipul Sarma, Azlina Khanam, Jesim Raja,
Sewali Kalita and others.
The protest march received visible media coverage across the region
except few Assam based media outlets which tried to frame the event as
a congregate of rightist people (read sympathizers to BJP). A Guwahati
based newspaper, owned by a Congress leader and edited by a Left
intellectual, reported that the protest march was sponsored by the
Hindu-centric agencies, where as another Assamese daily, edited by a
Left aligned journalist, simply killed the news, as if, it never
happened.
Nava Thakuria is veteran journalist from Guwahati