[Reader-list] Delhi Police Prevents Peaceful Protest in Front of Israeli Embassy – Students, Others, Injured and Detained

[Pradeep Agashe]

> 
> i really
> wonder why these young people don't get time for same
> type of peaceful protest agaist j & k govt. for not
> doing anything for kashmiri pandits or against bangladesh
> govt for persecuting bangla hindus? probably that will
> tarnish their 'SECULAR' image - what a great loss!
> with secular image they have to part with many things like -
> money, name, awards etc. in case of politicians
> 'votes' which they cant afford to lose.
> 
> --------------------------------------------
> On Tue, 15/7/14, Asit Das <asit1917 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> 
>  Subject: [Reader-list]
> Delhi Police Prevents Peaceful Protest in Front of Israeli
> Embassy – Students, Others, Injured and Detained
>  To: "reader-list" <reader-list at sarai.net>
>  Date: Tuesday, 15 July, 2014, 12:04 PM
>  
>  Delhi Police Prevents
> Peaceful
>  Protest in Front of Israeli
> Embassy –
>  Students, Others, Injured and
> Detained
>  JULY 14, 2014
>  
>  by Shuddhabrata Sengupta <http://kafila.org/author/musafir/>   kafila-org
>  
>  *A Tale of Two Protests, On
> Two Days.*
>  
>  Protests
> against the situation in Gaza have been held in
>  Delhi yesterday,
>  (Sunday,
> 13th July, and today, 14th July, in the morning).
>  Yesterday, on
>  Sunday morning,
> there was a peaceful protest in front of the
>  Israeli
>  Embassy – this came
> out of a call for protest by
>  individuals.
> Yesterday,
>  about a hundred odd people,
> including many young people, had
>  gathered.
> I
>  was present at this gathering. Some
> people made statements
>  condemning the
>  Israeli state’s aggression against the
> Palestinian people.
>  The Delhi Police
>  was present, but did not try to disrupt or
> disturb the
>  protest. The protest
>  happened right in front of the Israeli Embassy
> gates on
>  Aurungzeb Road.
> 
> [image: Protestor in front of the Israeli Embassy in
> Delhi
>  on Sunday, 13th
>  July
> 2014]
>  
>  Protestor in front
> of the Israeli Embassy in Delhi on
>  Sunday,
> 13th July 2014
>  [image: Protestors with
> Signs against Israeli State's
> 
> Aggression on Gaza,
>  in front of the Israeli
> Embassy in New Delhi, 13th July,
>  2014]
>  
>  Protestors with Signs
> against Israeli State’s Aggression
>  on
> Gaza, in front
>  of the Israeli Embassy in
> New Delhi, 13th July, 2014
>  
>  Today, another protest was scheduled, once
> again in front of
>  the Israeli
>  Embassy, at exactly the same spot as
> yesterday’s protest,
>  and this was
>  organized by students from Jawaharlal Nehru
> University, and
>  from Delhi
> 
> University. I was not present at this gathering, but
> spoke
>  to some people
>  who
> were there on the phone before uploading this post. Some
>  of those who
>  were present at
> yesterday’s protest, including, for
> 
> instance, Akbar
>  Chowdhury, president of the
> JNUSU, had planned to be there
>  at this
> protest
>  too. The protestors, comprising
> mainly students, were
>  stopped,
> arbitrarily,
>  first quite far away from from
> the venue.
>  [image: JNU Students Trying to
> Cross Barricades Put Up by
>  Delhi Police
> to
>  Prevent them from reaching the Road in
> front of the Israeli
>  Embassy in
>  Delhi. 14th July, 2014]
>  
>  JNU Students Trying to Cross Barricades Put Up
> by Delhi
>  Police to Prevent
> 
> them from reaching the Road in front of the Israeli
> Embassy
>  in Delhi. 14th
> 
> July, 2014 (Photograph by Jean-Thomas Martelli, from his
>  Facebook Post)
>  [image:
> Student Protestor being Manhandled by Policeman, in
>  front of the
>  Israeli Embassy
> in Delhi, 14 July, 2014. Photograph by
> 
> Jean-Thomas Martelli
>  (from his Facebook
> Post)]
>  
>  Student Protestor
> being Manhandled by Policeman, in front of
> 
> the Israeli
>  Embassy in Delhi, 14 July,
> 2014. Photograph by Jean-Thomas
>  Martelli
> (from
>  his Facebook Post)
> 
> 
>  There was very heavy police presence. Some
> protestors
>  managed to cross the
>  barricades put up by Delhi police, and reached
> the venue and
>  sat down. They
>  were negotiating with the police, asserting
> that it would be
>  a completely
>  peaceful protest with some statements,
> slogans, and singing
>  and that there
>  was no intention on anyone’s part to enter
> or attack the
>  embassy premises
>  in any way. Suddenly, as this was going on,
> some police
>  personnel began
>  attacking the protestors who were sitting on
> the road, and
>  began dragging
>  them. Then, all the protestors began being
> attacked with
>  batons. Kavita
>  Krishnan, general secretary of the All India
> Progressive
>  Womens
> 
> Association, who was present at the gathering who was
>  raising a slogan even
>  as she
> was being dragged away was hit on her lip with a
>  policewoman’s
>  helmet. The
> protestors, including Kavita Krishnan, and Akbar
>  Chowhury,
>  president of the
> Jawaharlal Nehru Students Union and an
> 
> activist with the
>  AISA (All India Students
> Association) who was present at the
> 
> gathering have
>  also been taken there are at
> present being detained at the
>  Tughlaq
> Road
>  police station.
> 
> [image: Kavita Krishnan, Tweeting from Tughlaq Road
> Police
>  Station]
>  
>  Kavita Krishnan, Tweeting from Tughlaq Road
> Police Station
>  
>  The police
> has been violent and abusive with the protestors,
>  they have been
>  beaten,
> several protestors have injuries, though apparently,
>  no one is in a
>  critical
> condition. Around fifty of them are still in
>  detention, as I
>  write, in the
> Tughlaq Road police station.
>  
>  When a news team from CNN-IBN reached Tughlaq
> Road Police
>  Station and tried
>  to interview Kavita Krishnan at the Police
> Station gate, she
>  was dragged in
>  by police personnel who were present and
> prevented from
>  completing her
>  statement to the news team.
> 
> 
>  What is it that makes the Delhi Police
> behave so differently
>  on two
>  successive days at the same place?
>  
>  1. Is it because a protest
> on a Sunday, when the embassy is
>  shut, and
> the
>  city quiet, is considered harmless, and
> a protest on a
>  Monday when the
>  embassy is open and the media active,
> considered
>  inadmissible.?
> 
> 
>  2. Or, is it because the Delhi Police’s
> by now familiar
>  hostility towards
>  any gathering featuring the presence of left
> wing student
>  groups,
> 
> especially from JNU, kicked in today, almost like a
> natural
>  reflex.Yesterday’s gathering did
> have some of the same
>  students present,
>  but it was not called by them. The call for
> today’s
>  protest went out on the
>  facebook pages of JNU students. It is
> noticable that
>  everytime JNU students
>  have tried to protest in the city on any
> issue, in the
>  recent past, they
>  have been prevented from doing so, with force,
> by the Delhi
>  Police. Police
>  reach the gates of the university to try and
> ensure that the
>  students do
>  not leave. And when that fails, they try and
> stop, divert
>  and detain them
>  on their way to the protest venue. This is
> becoming a
>  regular pattern.
>  
>  3. Or is it because, orders
> have come from ‘above’ that
>  say no one
> can will
>  be allowed to speak about
> Palestine in front of the Israeli
>  Embassy
> in
>  Delhi any longer.
>  
>  Or, is it a combination of all three factors
> above?
>  
>  When large
> peaceful protests with thousands of people can
>  happen in London
>  and New York
> in front of Israeli embassies and consular
> 
> facilities, why
>  does a gathering of a
> hundred odd peaceful young people in
>  front
> of the
>  Israeli Embassy invite batons, abuse
> and detention in a
>  police station ?
>  
>  See Also -
> 
> 
>  The Memory of Fifty Seven Seconds: After
> Watching an Israeli
>  Missile Strike
>  in the Gaza Strip on Al Jazeera
>  <http://kafila.org/2014/07/13/the-memory-of-fifty-seven-seconds-after-watching-an-israeli-missile-strike-in-the-gaza-strip-on-al-jazeera/>
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