Tag: Chandrasekhar Azad

Still Waiting for Chandrashekhar’s ‘Azad’ Vision After All These Years

The dispensation’s indifference to the freedom fighter can be seen by its acts, big and small, including the entrance fee it levies on people paying tribute to him at the iconic Azad Park in Allahabad.

Note: This article originally appeared on February 27, 2018, and is being republished on February 27, 2021, Chandrashekhar Azad’s death anniversary.

Today, as one remembers Chandrashekhar ‘Azad’, commander-in-chief of the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association, on his 88th death anniversary, the very act of remembering foregrounds a significant concern.

Revolutionaries like Azad dreamt of liberating their country from the shackles of enslavement and did not shy away from making any sacrifice whatsoever on the altar of their motherland. The question is, how have their cherished dreams been taken forward? How have things come to such a pass that notwithstanding all the slogans of making the revolutionaries’ dreams come true, those at the helm of the nation today have not the slightest affinity for their hopes and aspirations?

Every time this question confronts us, the reply is to be found in a pregnant silence or in comments so despairing as to leave you shaken.

On December 19, 1927, Ashfaqullah Khan, Ram Prasad Bismil and Roshan Singh, leaders of the Kakori conspiracy, were hanged by the colonial government. Credit: Wikimedia Commons

As for Azad, he did not give in to despair, not even when faced with the martyrdom of his closest comrades following their raid, in Kakori, on a train carrying the colonial government’s coffers. In the midst of the British government’s ruthless crackdowns, he changed the nomenclature of his organisation, the Hindustan Republican Association, by adding the word ‘socialist’ to its written constitution/manifesto, titled ‘The Revolutionary’; further, as the commander-in-chief of the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association, also known as the Hindustan Socialist Republican Army, he declared in no uncertain terms that “our fight will continue until the final verdict, either victory or death, is reached.” He made this pronouncement undeterred by the fact that ‘The Revolutionary’ had been presented as clinching evidence against the revolutionaries who had participated in the Kakori train robbery and fetched them all harsh sentences.

Statue of Chandrashekhar Azad at Alfred Park – now known as Chandrasekhar Azad Park – in Allahabad. Credit: CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Sadly, Azad’s own martyrdom robbed him of the opportunity of working for the establishment of the socialistic society he had dreamed about with comrades such as Ramprasad Bismil, Bhagat Singh, Rajguru, Sukhdev, Sachindranath Sanyal, Ashfaqullah Khan, Rajendranath Lahiri, Roshan Singh and Yogeshchandra Chatterji. Later, those who assumed the mantle of a free nation 16 years after his martyrdom journeyed in quite another direction. In their scheme of things fulfilling Azad’s dreams of a socialistic society did not seem significant.

On February 27, 1931, when Azad found himself surrounded by policemen faithful to the colonial government in Alfred Park – now known as Chandrashekhar Azad Park – and took his own life rather than surrender, it is said the whole of Allahabad overflowed with emotions. Despite threats from the police during the funeral rites at the city’s cremation ground in Rasoolabad, young men and women thronged to the cremation ground to collect Azad’s ashes in an urn and then took out a huge procession in the city. Addressing the gathering, Pratibha Sanyal, wife of the revolutionary Sachindranath Sanyal, had said Azad’s ashes would be accorded the same respect that had been given to Bengal’s martyr Khudiram Bose.

Even now on the day of his martyrdom Azad Park usually wears a festive look. But the powers that be in the state seem to be irked by it. They have ensured that it is no longer possible to offer flowers to the statue of Azad in the park without paying an entry fee of Rs 5. The idea being that the revenues collected can be used for its upkeep by the Allahabad Development Authority. This is like, in the words of chhayavadi poet Sumitranandan Pant, pouring scorn on the spirit and showering passion on mere shadow and spectre – showing concern for a park named after Azad while dishonouring the purpose for which he sacrificed himself.

To provide a context, Bhambri village, in district Alirajpur of Madhya Pradesh, where Azad was born, now goes by the name of Chandrashekhar Azad Nagar. Further, village Badarka in district Unnao of Uttar Pradesh, from where Azad’s ancestors migrated to Madhya Pradesh, has also acquired sufficient prestige and fame. This might give the impression that Azad has managed to escape the fate of the many revolutionaries whose memories have been cast into the abyss of oblivion. But, more importantly, there has been no meaningful effort to even acknowledge the hopes and aspirations Azad cherished for his country.

It was the horror of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre, which took place on the day of Baisakhi in 1919, which inspired Azad to plunge into the freedom struggle. In 1922, following the Chauri-Chaura incident when Mahatma Gandhi withdrew the non-cooperation movement which had inspired Azad’s active involvement, the turn of events left him dissatisfied. He changed the direction of his struggle.

On August 9, 1925, acting under the banner of the Hindustan Republican Army he successfully mounted the organisation’s first major operation, the train raid at Kakori. Notwithstanding the trial of his comrades who were caught, and the harsh sentences of death by hanging or imprisonment in Andamans’ Cellular Jail that they received, his activities continued, be it the targeting of Saunders in Lahore to avenge the death of Lala Lajpat Rai or the operation in Delhi during which bombs were thrown in the Central Legislative Assembly. Azad had wanted someone other than Bhagat Singh to accomplish this task. However, so insistent was Bhagat Singh on carrying out the operation that he was forced to relent.

Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru.

After Azad’s martyrdom, his mother Jagrani Devi paid a huge price for society’s ingratitude. Reduced to penury she subsisted on kodo grains to stave off hunger. When Jawaharlal Nehru learnt of her plight, he had an amount of Rs 500 sent to her. She later found a steadfast son in Sadashiv Malkapurkar, one of Azad’s most loyal followers. Until Jagrani’s demise on March 22, 1952, he fulfilled all the duties of a son, including the performance of her funeral rites.

Chandrashekhar Azad’s mother, Jagrani Devi (left) and Sadashiv Malkapurkar (right). Credit: makingindiaonline.in and guru97.blogspot.com

It is interesting to know that Jagrani Devi had wanted her son Azad to become a Sanskrit scholar; he chose to be a revolutionary who embraced martyrdom. For years she clung to the belief that her son would return, even tying a thread around two fingers, vowing to remove them only when her son returned. Her unending tears of anguish damaged her eyes. However, after Malkapurkar started looking after her, she attained a measure of happiness and would tell her neighbours, “Had Chandu been alive, what more than Sadashiv could he have done to take care of me?”

Malkapurkar’s mother had died when he was serving a 14-year prison term in the Cellular Jail in the Andaman and Nicobar islands for his part in the historic Bhusawal bomb case. In Jagrani Devi he saw shades of his mother. He felt proud that the mother whose sorrow had made her forget hunger and thirst for so many years finally breathed her last on his comforting lap.

However, rare is the human presence that breaks the deafening silence shrouding this brave mother’s memorial in Jhansi. Her memorial is virtually orphaned just as her martyred son’s dreams of a just society have been summarily abandoned. Nothing drives this message home as starkly as the passage of one more death anniversary of Chandrashekhar Azad.

Krishna Pratap Singh is a senior journalist based in Faizabad, Uttar Pradesh.

Translated from the Hindi original by Chitra Padmanabhan. Read the original here.

Batukeshwar Dutt: A Working Class Revolutionary’s Life

Remembering Batukeshwar Dutt’s revolutionary career, most of which was either spent in jail or hospitals, on his birth anniversary.

History often has the habit of relegating the number ‘2s’ to the margins, away from public memory. One such victim of history has been the HSRA revolutionary Batukeshwar Dutt, who is popularly known as the ‘associate’ of Bhagat Singh in the Assembly Bombing Case of 1929.

Dutt along with Bhagat Singh threw bombs in the central assembly (now parliament), to protest the Trade Disputes Bill and Public Safety Bill – introduced by the British government to curtail working class politics in India.  The Meerut Conspiracy Case, whereby three British communist activists were arrested along with 27 Indian trade union leaders, had alerted British authorities about the collaboration between Indian leaders who leaned towards socialism, and the Communist International.

The aforementioned bills were thus aimed at curtailing the activities of socialists and communists amongst the Indian working class.

Early life

Batukeshwar Dutt whose party alias was ‘Mohan’, was born on November 18, 1910, in Bengal’s Burdwan district to Goshtha Bihari Dutt and Kamini Devi. His early childhood was spent in Kanpur (Uttar Pradesh), where he studied at the Theosophical High School and Prithvinath Chak High School. It was while studying at the latter, that he made the acquaintance of Surendranath Pandey and Vijay Kumar Sinha, who went onto become his comrades in the future. He married Anjali Dutt in 1937 upon his release from the Andaman Jail, and had a daughter Bharati Bagachi.

Dutt died of cancer on July 20, 1965, in Delhi. He was frequently visited in the hospital by Bhagat Singh’s 85-year-old mother Vidyawati Devi, who had a lot of affection for him; she was with him during his last days. Dutt’s desire to be cremated in Hussainiwala (Punjab) – alongside Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru – was fulfilled by the then Punjab chief minister. A large procession had taken place in Delhi before his body was sent to Punjab by train.

Also read: Remembering Batukeshwar Dutt: Bhagat Singh’s Fellow Revolutionary, Forgotten in Life and Death

Early life as a revolutionary

The journey of Batukeshwar Dutt as a revolutionary activist began in his early teenage years, after witnessing the brutal beating of an Indian child at the hands of British subject on the Mall road in Kanpur. The child had wandered on the road which was prohibited for Indians.

This incident left a huge impact on the young Batukeshwarr Dutt and he started to seek out anti-colonial activists. Through Sureshchandra Bhattacharya, who was an editor at Pratap, Dutt came in contact with the revolutionaries like Sachindranath Sanyal (co-founder of the Hindustan Republican Association in 1924). Both Bhagat Singh and Batukeshwarr Dutt joined the revolutionary party around the same time.

The friendship between Dutt and Bhagat Singh only grew as they spend time in Kanpur. When Kanpur was flooded in 1924, both Singh and Dutt volunteered to be a part of ‘Tarun Sangh’- formed to help the flood victims. Dutt writes:

“…both of us were assigned duty together. Both of us stood by the side of Ganga in night, holding Lanterns so that, somebody who went into the stream made an attempt to reach the shore could be saved …”

Dutt also helped Bhagat Singh learn Bengali and introduced him to the poetry of Kazi Nazirul Islam, which he would often sing.

After the Kakori conspiracy case in 1925, the Hindustan Republican Association (HRA) was in total disarray with the arrest of several of its leaders and activists. During this time Batukeshwarr Dutt moved to Bihar and later to Calcutta where he participated in the activities of Workers and Peasant Party.

Dutt’s good knowledge of Hindi came in handy for the nascent party which was working among a lot of Hindi speaking migrant labourers in Calcutta. Dutt used to write pamphlets and posters for the party and was also briefly engaged with the Howrah branch of Scavengers’ union of Bengal. But as the HRA began to re-organise due to the efforts of Chandrasekhar Azad and Bhagat Singh, Dutt moved back to Kanpur. Dutt often volunteered eagerly to be a part of any ‘action’ that the party was planning to undertake

On December 19, 1927, Ashfaqullah Khan, Ram Prasad Bismil and Roshan Singh, leaders of the Kakori conspiracy, were hanged by the colonial government. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Bombing the assembly: April 8, 1929

The Hindustan Republican Association (HRA) in its post ‘Kakori’ era, was rapidly moving from individual heroic actions towards mass politics. Earlier armed struggle, terrorism and retaliatory strikes were the favoured tactics to challenge the British empire. In 1927, its name was changed to Hindustan Socialist Republican Association (HSRA), identifying socialism as one of the primary goals to be achieved in the struggle for independence.

Also read: Remembering India’s Revolutionaries, and How They Laid the Foundation for Freedom

The leadership was eager to let the people know about their changed objectives, and the need for a revolution by the masses. It was during these times that reading of socialist literature became a popular practice among its members. It was the result of the percolation of such ideas among revolutionary groups of north India, that along with ‘Long live the motherland’, ‘Long live the revolution’ and ‘Down with Imperialism’ came to become commonly used slogans.

The HSRA kept a close eye on the protests and lockdowns observed by the workers in the country during 1927-28. The solidarity expressed with those from the labour organisations of other countries, the financial support provided by the labour organisations of England, the active participation of British labour leaders towards a consolidated labour movement in India and the introduction of two Bills by the government to curb the above consolidation were the most closely observed by the HSRA.

The two controversial bills had faced nationwide protests and thus the Viceroy (using his special powers) had decided to pass the Public Safety Bill and Trade Dispute Bill immediately. These laws would declare all strikes as illegal and would term any strike as a mutiny against the administration. This was seen as an opportunity by the HSRA, to raise a strong voice against the imperial state.

Along the lines of a French anarchist Vellan, it was decided that as it took a loud noise to make the deaf hear, HSRA members would explode bombs (non-life threatening) just before the passing of these bills. Subsequently, they would throw leaflets with a declaration against the exploitative practices of the British government and raise slogans of ‘Down with Imperialism’ and ‘Long Live Revolution’.

The revolutionaries were not afraid to lay down their lives at the altar of revolution, in order to end the exploitation of man by man. In jail, B.K. Dutt and Bhagat Singh started one of the longest ever hunger strikes in modern political history. The strike, which ran for 114 days, was meant to demand better living condition for political prisoners.

After the Delhi conspiracy case

Batukeshwarr Dutt was awarded a life sentence in the assembly bomb case and was deported to the Andaman Cellular Jail. In the Andamans, Dutt participated in two hunger strikes for the rights of political prisoners and against the inhuman torture. Along with that he also played an important role in establishing Communist Consolidation, a Marxist study circle comprising of co-revolutionaries like Shiv Verma, Jaidev Kapoor, Bejoy Kumar Sinha etc. Dutt also used to write the handwritten magazine titled ‘The Call’, for the study circle which was edited by Jaidev Kapoor.

In the Andaman jail, a majority of the revolutionaries from Anushilan Samiti and Hindustan Socialist Republican Association (HSRA) underwent ideological training at their own initiative and later on joined the communist movement. Writing about the ideological transformation B.K. Dutt underwent in Andaman Jail, Manmathnath Gupta, a fellow revolutionary, wrote:

“Although [Initially] Dutt was not a studious revolutionary, in the studious environment of Andaman Jail he thoroughly read and engaged with Socialist theory….He had become a hard-core Socialist ”.

Batukeshwarr Dutt was later transferred from Andaman jail in 1937 to Hazaribagh jail, Delhi jail and finally to the Patna jail, ultimately being released on September 8, 1938, as his health began to deteriorate due to several aliments that he caught during the inhuman torture in Andaman. Dutt was released on the condition that he will not participate in any kind of violent political activity or will get associated with any political formation which professed violence. Mahatma Gandhi along with several other INC leaders played an important role in his release.

Also read: ‘Why Should We Not Rid Ourselves of This Entire Problem?’: Bhagat Singh on Religion

Upon release, with his health recuperating, he re-engaged in revolutionary politics, thereby violating the conditions of his release. Taking inspiration from Bhagat Singh and the HSRA, a lot of youth from Kanpur and Unnao district had joined the revolutionary movement and formed the Navchetan Sangh during 1933-34 under the leadership of Shiv Kumar Mishra, Shekhar Nath Ganguly and others. This organisation later merged with Navyuvak Sangh (Youth Association) during 1937-38 and worked as an open platform for the revolutionary movement in the United Provinces. It worked under the guidance of former revolutionaries like Jogeshchandra Chatterjee and Pt. Parmanand of Jhansi and steadily got associated with the Communist Party of India and Revolutionary Socialist Party.

There was a historic three-day conference organised in Mukar village of Unnao district in May 1939 by Communists groups and saw participation from former HSRA revolutionaries like Sachindranath Sanyal, Manmanthnath Gupt, Ramkishan Khatri, Vijay Kumar Sinha, Bhagwandas Mahor, Yashpal among others. The legendary Ghadarite leader Sohan Singh Bakhna was also a participant.

The conference was held under the president-ship of Batukeshwarr Dutt and ended with the formation of the provincial Navyuak Sangh. Shiv Kumar Mishra, in his celebrated work Kakori se Naxalbari Tak highlights the importance of this conference which brought together the revolutionary groups and the Communist party, who were working separately till then.

Batukeshwarr Dutt later also participated in the Quit Indian Movement in 1942 and was subsequently arrested, only to be released in 1947 i.e. after independence.

A procession in Bangalore during the Quit India movement. Credit: Wikimedia Commons

A procession in Bangalore during the Quit India movement. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Post-Independence life

Dutt withdrew himself from active political life after independence, mainly because of his disappointment from the state of affairs of mainstream politics at the time, but he continued his engagement with socialist literature.

As Manmathnath Gupt in his reminiscences of Dutt says:

“During our political discussions, he, like other of our comrades, used to say that this is not the freedom (Swarajya) we fought for, we never fought for this, and we wanted something different”.

Similar observations regarding Dutt’s political views were made by another fellow comrade Shiv Verma who was serving a jail sentence while Dutt was in the hospital.

Also read: ‘Class-Consciousness Can Stop Communal Rioting’: Bhagat Singh on Religious Violence

While B.K. Dutt was undergoing treatment in Delhi, he was visited by the president and the prime minister of India. While talking to them, Dutt made a very important remark, saying: “When you think of revolutionaries, you only think of them as men holding guns and completely forget the vision of society they stood for”.

This statement by Dutt summed up how the revolutionary movement and revolutionaries are still perceived as in the Indian psyche.

Dutt lived an unrecognised life in independent India, while finding it extremely difficult to make ends meet. With almost no financial aid from the state or the central government, he tried his hand at various things. He worked as an agent with a cigarette company for some time and went into the transport business as well, but nothing worked for him. He was appointed as a member of the legislative council in Bihar, but that too only for four months.

As a token recognition of their contribution towards the freedom struggle, Indian revolutionaries have various roads, round-about circles and colonies named after them. Batukeshwar Dutt’s legacy also met with the same fate. A residential locality, named as BK Dutt Colony, is one of the few namesakes that remain of the revolutionary in the city of Delhi where he exploded bombs ‘to make the deaf hear’.

The authors consulted Sudhir Vidyarthis’ work titled Kranti Ki Ibarate while writing this article.

Ankur Goswami and Harshvardhan are PhD research scholars at JNU.

Hathras: FIR Against Bhim Army Chief, 400 Others After Visit to Victim’s Family

Police have accused Chandra Shekhar Aazad of flouting Section 144.

Hathras: Uttar Pradesh Police have registered an FIR against Bhim Army chief Chandra Shekhar Aazad and 400 others for violating Section 144, that had been imposed in Hathras since Friday.

This had been done to prevent large gatherings outside the house and neighbourhood of the 19-year-old Dalit woman who had been gang raped by four ‘upper caste’ Thakur men and who eventually died on September 29, 15 days after the incident.

Her death has led to an outpouring of rage and protests across the country. Meanwhile, Uttar Pradesh Police stopped politicians and activists from making their way to the victim’s house.

The FIR was filed under multiple sections of the Indian Penal Code and Epidemic Diseases Act, for violation of Section 144 Code of Criminal Procedure in Hathras.

Chandra Shekhar Aazad at the victim’s house. Photo: Special arrangement

After initially having been denied entry into the village, Aazad and his supporters had  staged a dharna on the road in large numbers. 

The FIR, registered at Sasni police station, Hathras district on October 4 states that Aazad and his supporters flouted COVID-19 guidelines despite the police team allegedly trying to make him understand that Section 144 had been imposed in the area.

It also says that this led to obstruction of traffic movement on the road, and additional personnel had to be brought to the area to clear the protest site and allow movement of vehicles. 

Chandra Shekhar Aazad at Hathras. Photo: Special arrangement

On Sunday, a video went viral on social media which showed some men from the dominant caste in the village threatening Aazad.

In the video, one man can be heard saying, “Isko SIT pe bharosa nahin hai. Isko kanoon pe bharosa nahin hai. Ek baar mulaqat kar, hum tujhey bharosa dilaengey…ek baar bahar aa, beta tere bade bhai aaye hain mulaqat karne.”

Translated, this mean, “He [Azad] doesn’t trust the SIT. He doesn’t trust the law. Meet me once, I will restore your trust. Just come out once, the big brothers have come to meet you.”


A few hours after his protest on Sunday, Aazad was allowed to visit the family but police granted him permission with the caveat that he could not take more than 10 people with him. 

After meeting the family, he had said that the family were scared of retaliation from the dominant caste community and demanded that they be given Y-level security from the government. 

Last week, Congress and TMC leaders were also barred from meeting the family members of Hathras victim. After repeated attempts on Saturday, Congress leaders Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi had managed to meet with the victim’s family. A day before, they had been arrested by UP Police for attempting the same.

On the same day when Aazad visited the family, Samajwadi Party and Rashtriya Lok Dal members were lathicharged upon by UP Police personnel as delegations from the two parties met with the family.

Sanjay Singh, an AAP leader had also visited the victim’s family on Monday.

Also read: Hathras Case: At Massive Jantar Mantar Protest, Opposition Leaders Demand Yogi’s Resignation

On Sunday, UP chief minister Adityanath, taking a jibe at the opposition had said that the protests held by political parties are being conducted with the motive to incite ethnic and communal riots because, “They [opposition] don’t like development.” 

Aazad, in a press conference on Monday, again demanded Y-category security for the victim’s family . He also asked that the investigation be done under the supervision of a retired Supreme Court judge, according to the family’s wishes. He said that the family should be allowed to stay with him.

“I will have to keep them in my own house, if the state authorities fail to provide them with adequate security,” he said. He added, “If actress Kangana Ranaut can be given ‘Y’ category security, why can’t they? 

On Friday, Aazad had joined the the protest at Jantar Mantar in Delhi to demand justice for the victim. Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal was also present. 

‘Won’t Bow Before This Govt’: Aazad Promises to Carry on Anti-CAA Movement Before Leaving Delhi

‘I am ready to be led by my sisters and mothers of Shaheen Bagh. I am ready to be led by anyone who is ready to fight this battle.’

New Delhi: “Balidaan de denge, fansi bhi chad jayenge, hazaar baar jail jayenge, magar is sarkaar ke saamne jhukenge nahin,” Bhim Army chief Chandra Shekhar Aazad shot off these words on Friday.

Translated, they mean, ‘I will sacrifice my life, I will go to jail a thousand times, if need be I will also face death penalty happily but I will not bow in front of this government.’ 

Aazad, or ‘Ravan’ was addressing reporters on what how he plans to carry on the movement against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the proposed National Register of Citizens (NRC). 

Aazad had been arrested after he led the Daryaganj protest on December 20. The Delhi Police accused him of making an inciting speech from the steps of the Jama Masjid, that allegedly led to violence and arson. He was released on bail on January 15 on the condition that he will leave Delhi within 24 hours for at least four weeks. In the 24 hours which he was allowed to spend in the national capital, he was barred from attending any protests against the CAA and NRC.  

As the Dalit leader from Uttar Pradesh’s Saharanpur walked out of Delhi’s Tihar jail on the evening of January 16, he was welcomed by scores of his supporters with slogans of “Jai Bhim” and “Inquilab zindabad”. 

Having been prohibited by the court to attend any demonstration, Aazad spent his day at different places of worship. He visited Jama Masjid, Jor Bagh’s Karbala, Ravidas temple at Mandir Marg, and the Bangla Sahib Gurudwara. He made an an intermittent stop at the Indian Women’s Press Corps that had invited him for a discussion, before leaving the boundaries of Delhi by 9 pm. 

Bhim Army Chief Chandrasekhar Azad speaks at a press conference in New Delhi on January 17. Photo: PTI

“I do not oppose an Act like CAA (which grants relief to refugees) but this government has brought in a divisive Act that differentiates refugees on the basis of their faiths,” said Aazad, his trademark blue scarf firm around his neck. 

“Even the clothes that I wear today are because of Dr. B.R Ambedkar,”Aazad said, adding, “If he had not authored the Indian constitution and guaranteed us our rights, people like me and scores of other oppressed communities would have continued to face humiliation on a daily basis.”  

“Let me repeat my so-called provocative speech today,” he declared as he went on to recite the Preamble in Hindi again. 

“I went to Jama Masjid to protest against CAA-NPR-NRC, which I think are kala kanoon (black laws). I went there because Jama Masjid has historical relevance in our nationalist movement. Maulana Azad had exhorted Indian people to oppose Partition of India on religious lines from there. India is on the verge of yet another such partition today. It is my constitutional duty to oppose these laws,” said Aazad. 

Also read: ‘Have You Read the Constitution?’ Asks Judge as Delhi Police Oppose Bail for Aazad

He went on to talk about Part IV A (Article 51) of the constitution to highlight that it is the fundamental duty of every citizen to protect the constitution. “When the government itself is trying to divide the nation on the basis of religion, it amounts to nothing less than weakening the constitution. That is why I am fighting against CAA on the streets,” he said. 

He said that if he had the freedom, he would have visited the Shaheen Bagh protests.

“I hail the women of Shaheen Bagh who have been sitting on a dharna for a month. But I am also distressed by the fact that our prime minister can’t listen to their voices. If the clamour of my sisters and mothers of Shaheen Bagh do not reach our prime minister’s ears, then how will the voices of crores of people who live in villages reach him?”

He said the NRC in Assam had excluded around 19 lakh people, and wondered what would be the human cost of a pan-India NRC, which the Union home minister Amit Shah has spoken about and Modi has since denied the prospect of.  

Bhim Army Chief Chandrasekhar Azad holds a copy of the Indian Constitution during a protest against Citizenship (Amendment) Act at Jama Masjid in New Delhi on January 17. Photo: PTI

In the days to come, Aazad said, he will try to work towards building solidarity among all protesting groups, and raise awareness about ‘black laws’.

“Now that the BJP and RSS’s ‘Ram mandir’ agenda has been fulfilled, CAA-NRC is their new divisive agenda. I will tell people that we are more Indian than this government. I can give my blood to this country.

“I want to remind both our prime minister and the home minister that there is no court bigger than people’s court. The PM should not be thinking of himself as larger than the constitution. This country’s brotherhood is bigger than your politics,” he said. 

“For them, CAA-NRC may be an election agenda. They may withdraw it after West Bengal elections. But for us it is a fight to save this country, its secular ethos. We will not move an inch backwards. And I am confident we will win this battle.”

On a question on whether he wants to enter electoral politics, he said he had planned to contest elections but postponed it as he thought a larger battle to stop CAA-NRC is more urgent in current times. 

“I am ready to be led by my sisters and mothers of Shaheen Bagh. I am ready to be led by anyone who is ready to fight this battle,” he said. 

On a question about Shah’s comment that the anti-CAA protests are orchestrated by the opposition, he said, “The government is misleading people. This is purely a people’s protest. I will move ahead to make sure that the protests don’t lose their momentum.”

“The opposition is doing its role. I will also do mine. Jaati, dharam se bada ek mazhab hai, woh insaniyat hai. (‘There is a bigger religion than caste and faith, and that is humanity’),” Aazad said, as his supporters in the crowd cheered. 

Women’s Press Corp Cancels Permission Given to Bhim Army to Hold Press Meet

Azad’s lawyer says the press meet was to highlight the unprecedented move of holding a court inside a police station in Delhi which remanded 96 activists to 14-day judicial remand.

New Delhi: In a sudden decision, the Indian Women’s Press Corp (IWPC) withdrew permission given to Dalit rights organisation Bhim Army to hold a press conference scheduled for today on its premises.

Senior advocate Mehmood Paracha told The Wire that he, as the legal counsel for Bhim Army chief Chandrasekhar Azad and 95 others who were sent to 14-day judicial remand by a Delhi local court judge on August 22, was to address the press meet.

“What we wanted to highlight at the press meet was something unprecedented that happened in the country on August 22 which indicated that we have become an unofficial police state but the media hadn’t taken note of it. I had never heard of this before, but a court was held inside Delhi’s Kalkaji police station to hear the case of the 96 people arrested from a march to protest the demolition of a Ravidas Temple in South Delhi. There is a provision in the law where a judge can move the court to a school if, say, 5,000 people are accused of a crime because they can’t be accommodated in a small court room. But in this case, there were not even 100 people. This was what we wanted to highlight but were not allowed,” he said.

Also read: Press Council Intervenes in SC Petition to Back Media Restrictions in J&K

He said the press meet was to be held at 4 pm on August 23. “But around 2.30 pm, we got a mail from IWPC saying it is withdrawing the permission because as per its rules, it can’t give out space to a political or a religious organisation. But Bhim Army is neither. It is a social organisation,” Paracha said.

“Most organisations are under some pressure or the other these days from the government but we expected a journalists’ organisation not to bow down to police threat. We also feel it was connivance with the powers be as the last minute cancellation ensured that we couldn’t find an alternate venue to hold the important press meet,” he added.

On August 22, Azad and others were arrested after the march towards the demolition site in Tughlakabad area of South Delhi turned violent. The temple was demolished by the Delhi Development Authority on August 10 as per a Supreme Court order.

An IWPC member told The Wire that after the area SHO inquired about the press conference at their office on New Delhi’s Rafi Marg, the president, senior journalist Jyoti Malhotra, decided to cancel the permission given to Bhim Army.

She said, “The president later explained to us in our WhatsApp group that the permission was granted to Bhim Army because she was not fully aware of the rules which said the premises can’t be given for use by religious and political organisations. But some founding members of the club reminded her of it in the last minute, following which she withdrew the decision.”

Also read: Dalit Protest Over Temple Demolition Turns Violent, Cops Resort to ‘Mild Lathi Charge’

Though Bhim Army chief Chandrasekhar Azad declared that he would contest the last general elections against Prime Minister Narendra Modi from Varanasi, he later withdrew his candidature. Bhim Army, as Paracha pointed out, calls itself a social organisation that fights for Dalit rights.

The member said, “The president also told us that we don’t mind inviting Azad to IWPC to interact with our members, like we do with other political leaders but we can’t allow him to hold a press meet on our premises.”

Some members, she added, questioned the move “as it showed IWPC in bad light” and sought better clarity of the rules.   

EVM Malfunction: Does Criminalisation Deter Genuine Complaints?

Complainants may face a six-month jail term if their declaration is found false during a test vote. But the process does not differentiate between a deliberately false complaint and a genuine one.

New Delhi: On April 23, standing outside a polling booth in Guwahati, former DGP and well-known Assamese writer Harekrishna Deka complained to the local media, “Even though I pressed the button for a certain candidate, the VVPAT registered it under some other candidate.”

Deka said, “I challenged (it), asked him (the polling officer) why this happened. He said I could challenge it by paying Rs 2, but added that if I made a false complaint, I would be punished for six months. I do not want to take the risk. In what manner will you prove it?”

State chief electoral officer (CEO) Mukesh Sahu said that Deka can prove it by declaring it to the presiding officer. “The presiding officer will give him a form where he will have to declare that his statement is true. If found false, action will be taken.” Sahu told the news magazine InsideNE, “If he gives that declaration, he will have to show by giving a test vote [to prove] what he is saying is true. The form number is 49 (MA).”

Also Read: VVPATs: This Simple Proposal Will Help the Election Commission Clear the Air on EVM Use

Deka’s allegation about EVM malfunctioning causing votes to register for a different candidate is not new. In the the last two phases of voting for the general elections, several similar allegations have been made. During the April 11 phase, a voter from Meerut showed a video he had recorded with his phone camera as “evidence” to complain that his vote cast for the Bahujan Samaj Party (BJP) got registered for the BJP. The Times of India said, “Although officials replaced the ‘faulty’ machine, claiming it was a ‘malfunction’, non-BJP parties alleged that machines had been tampered with.”

Even as Deka was complaining to the media in Guwahati on April 23, news reports spoke of one voter in Kerala’s Kovalam complaining, “I have voted for Congress, but the picture [that] came on the (VVPAT) screen and the slip was lotus. I want to cast my vote again.” Yet another voter from Thiruvananthapuram too made a similar complaint during the day.

With several complaints coming from voters during the three phases of voting, it is worthwhile to highlight the mechanism put in place by the Election Commission of India (ECI) to register complaints.

Deka was not far from the truth when he said he would run the “risk” of a six-month jail term for complaining to the ECI about a possible malfunctioning of the EVM leading to votes registered to the wrong candidate.

As per rules amended by the ECI in 2013, the complainant will have to fill up a declaration form and be ready to cast a test vote to state that her/his allegations are “true and bona fide.”

What follows such a declaration does pose the question: Is it a veritable intimidation for and a deterrent to voters making genuine complaints?

As per the 2013 rules, the complainant can not only be jailed for six months under Section 177 of the IPC for “furnishing false information” but also fined a sum of Rs 1,000. News reports said the new rules were introduced along with the concept of printers for the paper trail of votes recorded by the EVMs through VVPAT machines.

It brings us back to the question that Deka posed to the authorities. “Who will take the risk?” An FIR was registered against the Meerut complainant after ECI officials found the machine was working ‘fine’. In the third phase too, an FIR was lodged against the voter from Thiruvananthapuram who lodged a complaint.

EVM machines, VVPATs and other election material being distributed among polling officers ahead of the first phase of polling in Tezpur, April 10, 2019. Credit: PTI

The case for decriminalisation

Last month, Tiruvalla-based Philose Koshy made the case for decriminalising filing a complainant under form 49 (MA). In a letter to CEC Sunil Aurora, Koshy, an IIT-Kanpur alumnus, wrote, “Free and fair election process, which is the bedrock of Indian democracy, would be under serious threat if voters fail to report the false VVPAT display for fear of criminal prosecution in case the complaint is “found” false by the ECI officials. The honourable Supreme Court has held in a catena of cases that the constitutional protection for the fundamental political expression is calculated to insulate the freedom from such a chilling effect.”

Koshy suggested that instead of the VVPAT slip directly dropping into the ballot box, the ECI should allow the slip to be collected by the voter and after inspecting it, drop it into the box.

Early this week, Koshy, along with Bhim Army leader Chandrasekhar Azad and Sanjeev Danda, secretary, Dalit Aadivasi Shakti Adhikar Manch (DASAM) demanded de-criminalisation of EVM complaints, besides demanding 50% VVPAT verification.

Speaking to The Wire, Koshy said, “The basis for EC’s criminalisation of the complaint against EVM malfunctioning is to stop false complaints. But it has not been able to differentiate between a deliberately made false complaint and a real one.”

He said this is particularly worrying when voting through EVMs is the main expression of a citizen’s right in a democracy. He said, “The voter only gets seven seconds to ascertain that her vote was correctly registered. She could be wrong at times. A voter must be allowed that right. Not everybody complains anyway. Also, there is no empirical evidence with the EC to conclude that voters will misuse such a facility.”

Also Read: The Election Commission Must Not Come in the Way of More VVPAT Verification

Koshy said in most cases, the voter cannot prove his/her point through a test vote, simply because a machine may not repeat the malfunction. “It is a like a car, which may not start sometimes. But when you call the mechanic, it suddenly does.”

Apart from suggesting voter verification before the VVPAT is dropped into a ballot box, Koshy also suggested to the EC to allow voters to click a photo so that they have proof to lodge a complaint. “But verification of the slip by the voter and manually dropping it into a ballot box is a much better option. If a photo is taken, the voter’s privacy may be violated,” he pointed out.

Intimidation and deterrent

Activist Teesta Setalvad also made a similar request to the CEC on April 1. “Under Section 49MA of the Conduct of Election (Amendment) Rules, 2013, the presiding officer of a polling station first ‘warns’ the voter on the consequences of filing a false complaint. This itself is an intimidation and a deterrent (given our vast socio-economic disparities),” she wrote.

Former CEC S.Y. Quraishi, who was not fully aware of the criminalisation of the complaint by the EC since 2013, however, felt that the entire process of voting through EVM/VVPAT “is a well considered move” and must be gauged from “the experience of it”.

“Theoretically, it is correct that a machine might malfunction one time and may not the next time. But the chances are very remote. About the rule, I would say that it is six years old, and what has been the experience of it? Is it just notional? How has it worked? How have the complaints been dealt with so far? Sometimes, a false complaint can delay the voting process. The system of a test vote by a voter was brought in only because the complaint has to be based on facts. But if it is proving to be too harsh on voters, it will have to be seen.”

The Dalit Question Is One That the Government Wants to Tame Under Draconian Laws

It is the growing, yet nebulous association of people from anti-caste groups and Leftist sections to resist violence and injustice that is being clamped down upon by the government in the name of threat to the present political system.

Speaking your mind and making critical political choices have become crimes in the world’s largest democracy today. Knowing and learning became questionable and punishable that we see political silence looming around us. The love for ideas, people and movements is repressed and hate of all forms is let to unleash itself unabashedly. Why is it that knowledge and love, but not ignorance and hate are being repressed unlike ever before in this country? Why is it that people and movements’ coming together invite the wrath of the government than considering them as an embellishment to democracy? The immediate background story behind the recent arrests of social activists unfolds over the last two years, but is not devoid of twists and turns… It is a story of the Hindu nationalist government’s failed attempts to appease Dalits and appropriate the Dalit question that soured just after a year they came to power.

Narrative of Dalit question as threat

The Dalit question was treated as a minor domestic issue by previous governments, while the Bharatiya Janata Party government nursed ambitions of facilitating Dalit votes in its favour by appropriating them into the Brahmanical Hindutva fold. It backfired when Rohith Vemula, a charismatic Dalit scholar, died on January 17, 2016 after putting up a months-long struggle with university authorities aided by the government. Dalit students mobilised a campaign at the University of Hyderabad which soon caught on at other campuses including the Jawaharlal Nehru University. Despite persisting ideological differences between the Left and the Dalit movement, they fiercely fought back repression by the Hindu nationalist government. The rise of young Dalit leaders like Jignesh Mevani after the flogging of Dalits in Una, in Gujarat, strengthened this evolving movement against the Hindu nationalist government.

This was a defining moment for Dalit politics for many reasons. The assertion that Dalit movement cannot be appropriated by the Hindu nationalist state prompted the government to respond towards Dalits with repression typically reserved towards the religious minorities. This shift in approach towards Dalit politics is evident in the detention and now the preventive custody under the National Security Act of Chandrasekhar Azad, founder of Bhim Army, in Saharanpur Jail, Uttar Pradesh. The Dalit question is no longer seen as an internal question to be resolved, but as one the government wants to tame under the draconian laws of national security. In other words, decades of Dalit resistance have captured the imaginations of people aspiring for equality and human dignity. This upsets those who want to retain the unequal and divided society.

Tenuous strings of hope

Another significant development which has caused a major disturbance to the government is the tenuous and nascent issue-based coalition that some Left-leaning activists and organisations seem to be developing with Dalit politics. Anti-caste politics, for the longest time, has questioned the Left in India for its failure to understand the caste question as well as for its Brahmanical, top-down approach in grassroots politics. The disdain was mutual because the Left also dismissed the question of identity or rather appropriated it in some places instead of engaging with it fruitfully. In recent times, though ideological differences exist, anti-caste student political groups as well as the Left student groups have allied in issues which are gaining momentum in the society at large.

This trend of concerned people and groups allying in spite of immediate differences to fight against caste, lynchings and discrimination supported by the BJP government is branded as a threat to the national security. Dalit and social activists targeted in the recent raids and arrests exemplify this insecurity of the Central government. Some of the social activists arrested have a long history of being part of people’s struggles.

It is interesting that now they are accused of instigating violence in Bhima-Koregaon, a symbolic victory Dalits have been celebrating every year for the last two centuries. It is the growing, yet nebulous association of people from anti-caste groups and Leftist sections to resist violence and injustice that is being clamped down upon by the government in the name of threat to the present political system. Bhima-Koregaon is used as the plot to trap Dalit and social activists this time. In some sense, an aspiration to resist violence, spread love and the dream of everyone having dignity of life are considered as acts against the government. At a time when love is punished and haters are hailed, the only way to stay alive and awake is by never stopping the struggle for dignity of life.

Carmel Christy teaches at the University of Delhi.