On August 5, Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi held a special press briefing along with some of the students who had allegedly been beaten up by the police during the July 20 Jantar Mantar protests. It is understandable that Rahul as the leader of opposition was doing his job to “expose” the police excesses and praising the “courage” of the students.
The students who accompanied him during the special briefing narrated their experiences as how they were allegedly beaten up by the police so mercilessly. One of the victims was alleged to have been hit by pellet bullets. But she did not show any of injury marks.
It is possible that the police may have used more force than required in dealing with the protesters. There are no standard yardsticks as to how much force the police can use, that too, when the protests were not at all peaceful and policemen were brutally attacked before they responded with, what the Congress alleges, brute force. That is quite debatable.
However, what was highly objectionable was the statement made by one of the “victims” of the “police brutality”, Farah Naaz, who said she had come from Uttar Pradesh to join the protest. She was not a NEET aspirant but a graduation student. She alleged the “police goons beat her up and injured her severely.” She didn’t have any injury marks though. Possibly they were gone within two weeks.
She alleged that she was specially targeted and maligned as “anti-national” because the cops got to know her name with which they identified her. “They judged me by my Muslim name, put me in a bus and kept me there for three hours after beating me up,” she claimed while quoting some police official saying that “their (Muslims’) list will be prepared separately because they are anti-nationals.”
This was a sweeping allegation against the police without any substance. It is impossible for the police to start asking names of the protesters in a mob. So, there is no question of anyone being “specially victimised” for being a “Muslim” as Farah Naaz suggested in the presence of Rahul Gandhi.
Also read: Beware of maligning our cops
There was another girl also present at the meeting. Her name was Muskan. She also played a victim saying although she is Muskan Sharma, since she used only first name, she is being taken as a Muslim and described as “anti-national”. She didn’t elaborate or illustrate when and how she was taken to be a Muslim and victimised for being that.
Surprising thing is that the two girls made these sweeping allegations without any evidence in the presence of Gandhi. Such statements are dangerous as these have the potential to cause a feeling of alienation among the people. It does not need one to be a radical or extremist to feel alienated after listening to such concocted stories particularly when narrated in the presence of someone like the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha and aspiring Prime Minister.
This is a vicious attempt to deliberately create a feeling of “otherness” among the members of the minority community. Girls like Farah Naaz appeared to had been tutored to make that type of statement.
It reminded of a similar claim during anti-farm law protests. It is often alleged that the farmers, being Sikhs, were accused of being “Khalistanis”. There is not a single statement from any leader of the ruling party or any official accusing the Sikh farmers of being “Khalistanis”. Yet the narrative was created and is still pedalled that they were accused of being “Khalistanis”, just because they were Sikhs. During the farmers’ movement, it was not only the Sikh farmers who were protesting. Majority of farmers were from Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh.
In the case of Cockroach Janta Party protests, some leaders of the ruling party did attribute the protests to foreign support and anti-national elements. But these allegations were made generally against the entire mass of students that protested. Playing up the “persecution” complex and expressing it without any proof of evidence deserves to be condemned.
The concerned authorities must approach Farah Naaz and get a complaint from her. She should be provided a chance to identify the cops who accused her of being “anti-national” just for being a Muslim. That will be the best course of action to deal with such situation and ensure that it does not happen again, if at all it happened.
And if the complaint is found to be false, relevant action according to law must be taken. We must not only condemn such attempts to malign and stereotype our forces of being against any particular community, but must nip this cancerous evil in the bud. This tendency is not only dangerous, but divisive as well.
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