Jantar Mantar protests expose growing disconnect between institutions & India's youth

More than the decision of the Chief Justice of India Surya Kant to not hear a petition on the allegations of atrocities committed by the Delhi Police on agitating students and young men and women, what was particularly unfortunate was his remarks that his time should not be wasted and that the judges of the country’s apex court was not interested in watching videos of the ruthless way in which the capital’s cops had apparently used pellet guns and batons against the protesters. 

Your Honour, we live in the era of social media and citizen journalism, where mobile phones are used to record events in real time with unprecedented ease. Remember, Sir, how your remark in court on May 15 about how unemployed youth and social activists should be compared with cockroaches went viral. Your denial and attempt to clarify what you said did not convince too many who had watched the recording of the court’s proceedings two days later. By then, a 31-year-old Dalit man in the US had created a so-called party that had more followers than those of the ruling party. The Cockroach Janta Party won hands down.

The agitation has transcended Abhijeet Dipke and 59-year-old Gandhian environmental activist Sonam Wangchuk, who, incidentally, happens to belong to a Scheduled Tribe. Neither they nor the police who work under the Union Ministry of Home Affairs anticipated that thousands of people would assemble at Jantar Mantar or Parliament Street on Monday morning – cutting across class, gender, caste and religion. The youth of India displayed their fearlessness. Closing metro stations and jamming internet services in the heart of the capital made them even more determined. As the police became more high-handed, the resilience of the youngsters increased. One young man urged policemen to beat him more. They held posters, sang satirical songs and reminded the cops about their children who are suffering because of a broken and corrupt education system.

Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan started mattering less than the obdurate Pradhan Mantri. The shrieking anchors on prime-time television had become objects of ridicule. They were nowhere to be found outside their air-conditioned studios. The youngsters were sweating it out in the humid atmosphere and getting drenched in the rain.  They had become their own journalists and communications practitioners. The irrelevance of the godi media for largest sections of young India was never so evident as it is today.

The TV anchors should have realised that many supporters of the BJP had switched their allegiances because of the brutal actions of the police.

Before concluding, a disclaimer is in order. This writer delivered a 40-minute speech on the Jantar Mantar stage at the invitation of the CJP’s spokespersons before all Opposition political parties had rallied behind them. I had named the television anchors who were conspicuous by their absence, talked about how votes being stolen across the country, how donations had been stolen from the temple in Ayodhya that had been built in the name of Lord Rama, in whose name the BJP had come to power. In conclusion, I remarked that the youth of India would not allow their future to be stolen.
(The writer is a senior journalist, author, publisher and maker of documentary films and videos.)