Of the 965 students – 90 Muslims and of which 6 students of the Government college in Udupi chose to skip classes than attending it with proper code mentioned. These six students weren’t attending classes since 31st December 2021. Three weeks ago they preferred to come back to college but with the Hijab which they consider is their fundamental right.
Their videos and pictures stating they were denied fundamental right to education because they chose to attend classes with hijab started spreading and the likes of Swara Bhaskar immediately came in support of them. The matter started gaining attention with more students joining the protest across various educational institutions. But unlike other sites of protests, the Hindu students of Udupi chose not to wait for administration but to give the pills the way they thought fit. Some students who were maintaining the decorum of the college and following the code of conduct also started wearing saffron shawls to the college. Matter started gaining more momentum.
As if this was not enough, a reputed newspaper covered the story of so called “heckling” of a student of minority and piece loving community by a Hindu boy. They went on to put the photograph on important place in the Newspaper – was this responsible reporting? a question still remains unanswered. However in my opinion they failed to show photograph of the other part of the story where she was safely taken inside college and on other side of the protest where a Hindu boy was in fact harassed by a group of minority students.
The protest soon spread like Omicron variant to other cities like Kolkata, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Karnataka Bhavan and the first love of protesters the Shaheen Bhag site in Delhi. Their reaction and comments reminds us of the subject knowledge which many film celebrities exhibited during anti-CAA protests. These protesters had no knowledge of why they were protesting. All comments zeroed down to Modi, Yogi and Shah. Except for getting covered in black and white headlines and showcasing their unity before elections these protests proved nothing.
The protest also started gaining attention from the not so-cool neighboring countries who if had spent the time they spend in interfering in Indian matters in gaining some more foreign aid would have been proved boon for them.
Inspired by Talibani Victory in Afghanistan, Girls’ Islamic Organisation (GIO) allegedly forced Hindu girls to wear Hijab in Nagpur (India) on World Hijab day on 4th Sept, 2021.
This was the headline of various digital media who were right. Interesting is to note that even on the day they celebrate so as World Hijab Day these students didn’t insist for it. The timing of the protest they chose, not so surprisingly, is just when seven states are going into assembly elections including Uttar Pradesh.
Modi 2.0 is all about protests for the extremists which are left. The anti CAA protest started around 4 December 2019 and the capital was scheduled to go for polls on 8 February 2020. The farmers’ protest started around 9 August 2020 and the election state then was Bihar with poll dates announced as 28 October 2020.
The UP election result will be declared after counting on 10th march 2022. Delhi election which went the AAP way with good majority wouldn’t have been possible but for the anarchism spread in the capital and the free bijli paani incentive. Bihar election still went the NDA way. It would be interesting to see which domain the extremists prick upon and to what extent and intensity they stoop low to when Gujarat goes into election phase.
