The politics of protest space

An edited version appeared in The Indian Express on April 9, 2011.

Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, April 8, 2011

After midnight when the television channels were showing reruns of their protest street coverage, a few men were silently pinning their poems, and cards on the walls.
Only the hunger strikers and a few supporters remained. About 150 of them. The shrunken space was all theirs.
Anand Singh from Ghazipur was claiming his space. He was asserting his identity.
“Hum woh nahi jo tumhe rahon mein akela chor denge
Hum woh nahi jo ek pal mein nata tod denge
Hum toh aapke woh chahne walen jo aapki tooti sanso mein apni saans jor denge ...”
A card was stuck on the wall addressed to “Mrs. Sonia.”
“This is my first hunger strike in my life. Credit goes to you.”
Suddenly everyone had a forum.
The protest had two faces – the one that was caricatured and captured during the day, the other, more real that simmered through the night and reclaimed the space from the television crews.
A few candles were still fighting it out. The crowd had thinned. The OB vans were parked in a lane, submerged in darkness, and not so intrusive as they were during the day when they hailed the street as
Tahrir Square, a spot where revolution was being born.
The space was up for grabs. Everyone had a context, a connection, a sales pitch.
Through the day, the street had become a marketplace of sorts, too, with LVA (Layered Voice Analysis) representatives permeating the crowd and handing over their pamphlets to the people who had gathered.
They claimed they had patented the technology that could decode voice to “reveal human intensions, to detect deceit and frauds and thus help Fight Frauds, Corruption and Crime.”
They were experts at “Unlocking the Secrets of the Voice. Revealing the DNA of thoughts.”
On the sidelines, the vendors were happily selling food. A man had even come with a bag carrying cheap sandals and was sitting at the protest street waiting for buyers.
Shyam Nath has been here for the last two days. He was selling snacks. A few children were crouching and hunting for leftovers.
“I usually come when the rally comes. I saw on television and thought my sales would go up,” he said. “I know they are fasting but others are not.”
Manish Tiwari, a Delhi University student, was perched precariously on a bench and carried a huge placard.
“Suno … bharat ki galiyon se yeh awazen aati hai. Jinhe bhains charana tha, woh sarkaren chalate hai.”
“After so many days, I have got a forum,” he said.
On Thursday, the protest street near the Jantar Mantar monument was rediscovering its own potential. In this colorful and vocal space, other protests movements that had been relegated to the periphery had decided to inch closer and show support to Hazare's agitation that was hitting the headlines.
Bharat Swabhiman Yuva Sangathan, the Indian Ex Servicemen Movement, Art of Living were among the first few. Later, Paryavaran Sanrakhshan Parishad entered the street beating dhols.
A horde of television crews had descended on the street capturing the mood at what they referred to as “revolution ground” similar to Tahrir Square in Egypt.
They weren't going to let the moment of their redemption slip away from them.
“We decided we have to take this up. Else, people will say that the media has been bought over, it is corrupt,” Akhilesh Singh, a reporter with Sudarshan News, said. “What is immoral here?what's wrong is supporting the movement?”
Ravish Kumar, anchor and reporter at NDTV, was standing on a raised platform, taking in the ariel view of the dharna. He had found his ground, his pitch.
“I am not fasting but I am supporting this. I even went on the dais yesterday and spoke about it,” Kumar said. “This has revived the dharna concept. If you get an opportunity to be honest, objectivity gets better.”
CNN IBN's Rajdeep Sardesai came in the evening to anchor his 9 pm show. He had tweeted earlier.
“off to Jantar Mantar. Is it India's Tahrir Square in a manner of speaking? Hope to anchor india at 9 from there.”
His wife Sagarika Ghose tweeted she was delighted to see her son at Jantar Mantar.
After 12, when the cameras stopped rolling, people laid claim to the agitation, asserting themselves through art, slogans and manifestos.
A few men spoke about their frustrations, the ordeals of the common man who had been tagged as middle class. They spoke about their mounting electricity bills, the taxes, the corruption during the Commonwealth Games, the numerous other scams that had disillusioned them. The least they could do was come there and show solidarity with this apolitical agitation.
Rashmi Singhal, an advocate at the Tis Hazari Court in Delhi, had decided to volunteer through the night. In the evening, she had heard them announce they would need people to assist.
"This is everyone's movement. We had all been waiting for someone to do this,” she said.
A man was sweeping the street. He too was claiming the space inch by inch.