I agree with you partially. I totally support the NEET cause,but I don't support CJP. I totally want the minister to resign and the government to be held accountable. I am from Delhi itself, have my office on Cannaught place and have been a part of the protest since Day 1. Lemme share my insights and I hope we can be civil about this discussion -
1. No CJP leader, and I mean literally no one there, really cares about the NEET students, or else they would've talked about NEET paper leak only, but they've talked about literally everything other than NEET there. Was there any genuine teacher present there in the leadership who teaches for NEET ? Who knows the ins and outs of the exam ? No ! A protest similar to this also happened in JULY 2024 regarding the deaths of UPSC aspirants in Delhi. I went there too (since I am preparing for the exam and my locus standi applies). All of the credible faculty was present there, but here that was not the case.
2. The crowd that gathered had mostly people in their thirties, not at all NEET aspirants. Most of the aspirants were celebrating or studying post the Re-NEET result. The 5-10% innocent kids who did get influenced went there and they were the ones who got caught in the stampede-like situation.
3. Now onto the stampede like situation that happened, was majorly because the protestors vandalised the metro and public property first. Delhi Police repeatedly requested the protestors to protest peacefully, and as far as storming towards the parliament is concerned, a prohibitory order was already issued far and wide that "any person violating these prohibitory orders shall be liable under section 223 BNS." There are multiple posts circulating on social media that the police themselves placed vandalised cars on the scene to frame the students or the political party in power sent their goons. Let's not dive into that because it is still a media post at this point, that would also be fact checked in due time. What I saw from my eyes were people wearing bags and cockroach masks and pelting stones.
4. Mind you this is the same police force who were protescting the protestors day and night so that they could protest peacefully. If they wanted to supress their voices, their permit to protest won't have been extradited so quickly. They were granted permit in 1 day whereas the standard time for the procedure is 7-10 days normally , even an SOP procedure takes 48-72 hours. They are the same officers who, even after getting injured themselves, were seen giving first aid to kids who were injured and who fainted on the scene. One kind officer also dropped me home on his bike because the metro had to be shuttered down to avoid loss of life and property and the CJP peeps were not letting any vehicles pass through (the SC has already said this during th CAA protests in 2020 that you have the right to protest, but not restrict the right to movement of other civilians), the guy was bleeding from his forehead and still he ensured my safety. Putting the blame entirely on the forces is not correct.
5. If the protest was meant for NEET, what did the protestors gain from abusing the Indian army, demanding the reinstation of article 370, making casteist remarks, groping and harrassing female reporters (BTW the media post of a girl being groped, her clothes being torn and her hair pulled is false- it has been fact checked already) , stating inflammatory statements like "kashmir is not an integral part of India" and stone-pelting an ancient religious site ? Why this attack on the sovereignty of nation ? How , in the bloody hell, is all this related to the NEET issue ?
6. I am not denying student involvement in the protest. Students were present there, genuine students who were aggreived by the whole situation. I asked many people around and they did say, and I quote "todfod nahi karni chahiye thi" , "kuchh bade log bacchon ko uksa rahe hain" , "didi hum to yahaan NEET ke liye aaye they, koi sun nahi raha". And I agree, bade log, ye leaders, ye so called CJP leadership, ye uksa ke chale gaye logon ko, lekin lathicharge se pehle sab gayab !?
7. About the lathicharge - when you fail to hear multiple requests made by the authorities and the hooliganism gets out of hand, Standard Operating Procedures do come into force. Jo log keh rahe hain democracy is dead, unhein ye samajhna chahiye that constitution gives you the right to protest *by peaceful means* and *subject to reasonable restrictions of public order and morality*, both of which were missing there. Exercising your rights comes with performing your duties also. One such duty is protecting and conserving public property (which is also a part of the constitution by the way). Teargas and lathicharge happened when the situation got out of hand really. There are, in fact, stricter provisions for the security of Parliament.
8. Coming to accountability - everyone in India has learnt the idea of Satyagraha (peaceful protest) from Gandhiji. But why are his teachings being used selectively ? When the chauri chaura incident happened, as the leader of the Non Cooperation Movement, Gandhiji took responsibility for the movement turning into a bloodbath, condemned the act of the people and withdrew the movement because he did not stand for violence. The same could've been done by the CJP party leadership too when they advocate for peaceful protest. The least they could've done is condemn the abusive remarks on Army and the vandalism that happened (nobody is asking them to call off the movement). One should always practice what they preach- if you are asking for accountability from someone else, you own accountability is also at stake all times, failing which your credibilty does go down. You can see for yourself CP ki kya halat ho gayi hai, footpaths aur fountains ke tiles tak tod ke pelting ke liye use kiye gaye hain. They don't even pay taxes for the public property that they are vandalising bhai !!
9. Bringing out swords against the forces is not something that students do. But it happened yesternight. How did they even get access to these weapons is still not clear.
10. Another fake news being propagated that Army is desployed in Delhi to deal with the protesters. That is also not True, has been fact checked by Indian Army themselves. CRPF companies and Delhi Police have been handling them.
All in all, we have to be sensible enough to distinguish the students from the hooligans. The whole cause was hijacked by the politicians for their personal gains and the voice of our innocent students got lost somewhere. I have said it once and I will say it again - "we stand with the NEET students. Paper leak was wrong. Dharmendra Pradhan needs to resign. Govt. Needs to take accountability. CJP Is no messiah of the students, contrary to what is being portrayed."
People who abuse our Armed Forces should be ashamed of themselves. No context justifies you abusing them, when you yourself have done nothing for the country and they are the ones who give the supreme sacrifice only so we can sleep at home peacefully.
If you read all this and are sensible enough to understand the sensitivity of the situation, you are welcome to discuss the issue more. But if you refuse to see both sides of the coin, then you can label me an "andhbhakt" or whatever else derogatory term you can coin with your limited thinking and analysis capacity, and respectfully, move on.
