[WSMDiscuss] India in movement…. : Fwd: ‘Not In My Name’ protest in India / #Notinmyname / Statement from Not In My Name, Delhi (Sanjay Kak)

[JS CACIM]

Saturday, July 1, 2017

India in movement….

[Here, following my last post on what is happening in India today (‘Toll From Vigilante Mobs Rises, and India Begins to Recoil’, on June 29), are some fragments from and on resistance that is beginning to take shape there, in this case in the form of a ‘Not In My Name’ protest that took in place on June 29 in New Delhi and in other cities across India – and also in Toronto, in Canada.

[While posting, let me mention here that I am today embarking on a three week personal journey into my past, and perhaps into my future, and so will probably not be posting at all during this period, or certainly much less.  I will however be checking my mail, and will try to at least keep up with my responsibility as list admin :

Maya Rao at the ‘Not In My Name’ protest in New Delhi

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieFW8wO2lmY <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieFW8wO2lmY>
Take a look also at some of all the other related posts, of similar actions taking place across the country – and also abroad, such as in Canada : 

https://www.facebook.com/events/1935457646677104/ <https://www.facebook.com/events/1935457646677104/>
A day after Jantar Mantar

#Notinmyname / Statement from Not In My Name, Delhi

Sanjay Kak

            Thanks, Purnima, for posting these, and thanks Sanjay, Maya, and others, for what you have done and said and are doing…

            With sadness but also in dignified rage and in solidarity –

            JS

fwd
> Begin forwarded message:
> 
> From: Purnima <guptapurnima at gmail.com>
> Subject: Sanjay Kak a day after not in my name!
> Date: July 1, 2017 at 12:45:06 AM EDT
> To: Jai Sen <jai.sen at cacim.net>

Sanjay Kak - A day after Jantar Mantar

#Notinmyname / Statement from Not In My Name, Delhi

Last evenings spirited protest at Jantar Mantar, New Delhi, under the banner of Not In My Name, was an autonomous citizens protest against the recent spate of targeted lynchings of Muslims in India – the most recent of 16 year old Junaid, stabbed to death on 23 June 2017 in Delhi (NCR).

For an audience that was estimated to be 3500 strong, the torrential downpour at a little past 8 pm may have rained out a part of the programme. But something remarkable had already been achieved: the evening had washed away, even if temporarily, an almost overwhelming sense of despondency, of hopelessness, and of fear. 

Since the Not In My Name protest had announced that the platform was not meant for political parties, and their banners and slogans, the stage saw the marked absence of the speeches (and faces) of routine protest meetings at Jantar Mantar. Rhetoric was displaced by feeling, and it was left to the poets and musicians to carry the sharp political messages of the day. On an evening that was often very emotional, the most difficult moments came when a group of young men from Junaid and Pehlu Khan's extended families (and residents from their respective villages) came on stage and spoke to the audience.

When the call for a protest meeting went out last Sunday we were hoping that a few hundred people would gather to express their outrage at what is happening around us. For the attacks on Muslims are part of a pattern of incidents that targets Dalits, Adivasis, and other disadvantaged and minority groups across the country. In almost all these incidents the possibilities of justice seem remote, as the families of the victims are dragged into procedures they are ill-equipped to handle. Through all these heinous crimes the Government has maintained a silence, a gesture that is being read as the acquiescence of all Indians. 

Not In My Name aimed to break that silence. But the scale and spirit of the protest meeting at Jantar Mantar became amplified many times over, as similar gatherings were spontaneously announced all over the country. As word spread through social media, groups in 19 other locations announced Not In My Name protests, and this phenomenal synergy inevitably drew media attention to all the events, and gave the protest a solidarity and scale that was truly unprecedented – there were at least 4 protests in cities abroad too. (And more protests have been announced for later this week...)

The protest meeting ran on the shoulders of a group of volunteers who managed to put together everything in less than four days. No funds were received (or solicited) for the expenses from any political party, NGO, or institution. Instead volunteers worked the crowd and our donation boxes received everything - from Rs 10 coins to currency notes of Rs 2000, and everything in between.

The impact of the Not In My Name protest at Jantar Mantar yesterday only points to the importance of a focused politics to deal with the crisis this country seems to be enveloped by. Less than a day after the protests Prime Minister Modi broke his silence on the matter of lynchings. It could not have been a coincidence: speaking in Ahmedabad he said killing in the name of gau bhakti is unacceptable. But to protect the life of a 16 year old being brutalised in a train needs more than a tweet, and we all wait and watch.

This fight has just begun. In the days to come the exceptional solidarity attracted by the protest in New Delhi will have to become less exceptional, and more everyday.

______________________________
Jai Sen

jai.sen at cacim.net <mailto:jai.sen at cacim.net>
www.cacim.net <http://www.cacim.net/> / http://www.openword.net.in

Now based in New Delhi, India (+91-98189 11325) and in Ottawa, Canada, on unceded Anishinaabe territory (+1-613-282 2900) 

Recent publications :

Jai Sen, ed, 2016  – The Movements of Movements, Part 1 : What Makes Us Move ? (forthcoming in 2017 from New Delhi : OpenWord and Oakland, CA : PM Press), ADVANCE PREFINAL ONLINE MOVEMENT EDITION @ www.cacim.net <http://www.cacim.net/>
Jai Sen, ed, 2013 – The Movements of Movements : Struggles for Other Worlds, Part I. Prefinal version of Volume 4 Part I in the Challenging Empires series. New Delhi : OpenWord.  Prefinal version 1.0 available @ http://www.into-ebooks.com/book/the_movements_of_movements/ <http://www.into-ebooks.com/book/the_movements_of_movements/>
FORTHCOMING PUBLICATIONS  :

Jai Sen, ed, 2017a – The Movements of Movements, Part 1 : What Makes Us Move ?.  Volume 4 in the Challenging Empires series (New Delhi : OpenWord and Oakland, CA : PM Press).  Available for pre-order at PM Press <http://www.pmpress.org/>
&

Jai Sen, ed, 2017b – The Movements of Movements, Part 2 : Rethinking Our Dance.  Volume 5 in the Challenging Empires series (New Delhi : OpenWord and Oakland, CA : PM Press)

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