Los Angeles Expresses Solidarity with Shaheen Bagh

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(2/22/2020, Los Angeles, Calif.) Having recently held rallies across California attended by thousands of people, a group of Indians and Indian American residents of California have founded the Coalition for Democracy and Secularism in India. The Coalition aims to lend solidarity to the protests being led in India against the recently passed Citizenship Amendment Act and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The Coalition shall further focus on raising awareness on the fascist policies being enacted by the government and engage with the local community to uphold accountability for such actions.

On Saturday, February 22, the diverse members of this coalition organized a Shaheen Bagh styled sit-in aimed at expressing solidarity with the 24/7 hour sit-in movements across India led by women for the last 2 months. Attended by over 300 people, this event was the first of the kind outside India and hoped to draw global attention towards the massive protests in India against the implementation of the unconstitutional CAA and NRC. The event lasted for 4 hours and saw participation from several Individual activists and civil rights and liberty organizations. A moving moment of the program was when the gathering was addressed live by protestors at Shaheen Bagh in Delhi and slogans of solidarity were loudly raised. As a symbolic expression of defiance, a feast of Biriyani was organized. This was meant to mock the ruling party which had tried to malign the protestors at Shaheen Bagh claiming that the protestors were only there to eat Biryani. Videos of this defiance has since gone viral. The crowd was also addressed by several activists, academicians, students, interfaith leaders, and entertainers. An art exhibit that highlighted the police brutality on the peaceful protestors in India was also set up.

On 19th November 2019, the Home Minister of India, Mr Amit Shah declared in Parliament that the National Register of Citizens will be implemented all across India. The NRC exercise presumes every Indian to be a potential ‘illegal immigrant’ until they can prove otherwise. This forces millions of poor and homeless, Adivasis, Dalits, trans-people, etc. who are legal citizens but have incomplete legal records to be potentially put into detention camps. Compounding this already mammoth exercise of disenfranchisement, on 4th of December 2019,  the Government passed the Citizenship Amendment Act which preferentially grants citizenship for members of Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi, and Christian religious minorities, who had fled persecution from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan but systematically excludes members of Ahmadiyya or Rohingya communities who are also severely persecuted minorities for the sole reason that they identify with Islam. The CAA and NRC combined have the potential to render millions of Muslims, transgenders and Dalits stateless alongside creating grounds for arbitrary detentions, tools of state coercion, voter suppression, etc.

To make matters worse, the government has ordered a severe crackdown on any form of protest. Towards this, internet and communication lines are being shut down and police brutality has been at an all-time high. While firing water cannons and tear gas has almost become mainstream, incidents have also been reported where the police fired bullets at students, stripped minors and allegedly committed custodial rape. As of today, 27 people have been killed by police violence while more than thousands have been arrested. Despite such oppression, the spirit of the general public in India to fight against discrimination in the face of the severe crackdown has been commendable. Last week, almost 250 million people were on the streets protesting against the Modi regime. Women in several cities have occupied public roads for sit-in protests while others have blocked Modi's access to entering major cities.

Today, India is at the verge of genocide and the people of India are fighting with their lives to protect their constitution and defend the secular fabric of their country. At such points in history, it is a responsibility for all of us to speak up against the Modi regime. The only way this genocide can be prevented is by forcing the Modi Government to roll back the NRC and CAA. To achieve this, we need to make our voices heard through mediums such as yours lest the narrative is hijacked by Fascist organizations and we are left to studying this as another dreadful chapter in history.