Meenakshi Shedde: Carter Road karma

Illustration/Uday Mohite

Last Sunday, I participated in the Carter Road protest against the rape of minors in Kathua in J&K, and Unnao in UP. Hundreds of people turned up, with homemade placards, in response to a poster calling for the protest, that named no organisation or individual. So, at the venue, a large and diverse number of people claimed to have organised it. It was inspiring to see such a large turn-out. The sense of anger and betrayal was palpable - against a government that actively defended the rapists, instead of promptly punishing them. In Unnao, Kuldeep Singh Sengar, accused of raping a minor girl, is himself a BJP MLA. In Kathua, after an eight-year-old girl was gang-raped and murdered, BJP ministers Chaudhary Lal Singh and Chander Prakash Ganga joined a rally to defend the rapists, and later resigned only under duress.

The Carter Road protest soon went into freefall, as various speakers onstage spoke in contradictory voices about the future course of action: some demanded the death penalty, while a senior citizen on stage insisted, "India needs the Sharia law to hang the rapists without trial." Sigh. Hats off to the organisers for mobilising such a large crowd. But with the best of intentions, they appeared disorganised; without a planned strategy, clear goals, or actions the public could take, the protest swiftly dissipated. Each time a speaker demanded accountability from the government, the organisers shut them down, claiming the protest was apolitical and only about gender issues, not accountability! Human rights lawyers, activists and ordinary citizens in the audience said that this shutting down of questions of accountability was disturbing.

Human rights activist Feroze Mithiborwala, who was shut down, suggested that the protest's organisers partly included those with affiliations to the powers that be, strategically organising a pseudo-protest, then ensuring its swift dissipation. He said one of the organisers present had already done the same at the Azad Maidan rally two days earlier. If true, it seems like an insidious new 'embedding' strategy to appear sympathetic to the public on key issues, while co-opting them.

Frustrated, I asked human rights lawyer Vijay Hiremath, what actions the crowd could have taken. He suggested that, as sexual assaults on women have occurred under both the BJP and Congress governments, the public could form a team that systematically follows up sexual assault cases on social media. For instance, a trustee of an international school in Mumbai was accused of raping a three-year-old student, but the police did not take action for six months. Nowadays, the government, as well as the Mumbai Police, are swift to respond, especially on twitter, so the public should follow up individual cases on twitter, he said.

'Lokanche Dost' planned to organise a mass "Shiv pratigya" (promise in Shivaji's name) to protect women, on April 21 at Azad Maidan. Some try to practise the great man's ideals with minimal drama; others, less sure of themselves, shunt him out to sea.

Meenakshi Shedde is South Asia Consultant to the Berlin Film Festival, award-winning critic, curator to festivals worldwide and journalist. Reach her at meenakshishedde@gmail.com

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