Q40 Non-Party Action

Following is the Excerpts from the book Audacious Hope: An Archive Of How Democracy Is Being Saved in India by Indrajit Roy. Published with the permission of the publisher, Westland.

 

 Opposition to the CAA across the north-east was not merely a primeval reaction to the possibilities of a demographic invasion. As critics pointed out, the legislation does not only exclude Muslims—animists, ancestor-worshippers and other practitioners of the region’s myriad faiths and traditions were also excluded. To avail of the CAA’s provisions, they would have to identify themselves as Hindus or Buddhists rather than as practitioners of their specific faiths. Members of such trans-border communities as Khasis, Garos and Hajongs face persecution on account of their tribal identities and are often evicted from their lands, compelling them to seek refuge in India.

Perhaps the most iconic and well-documented protest against the CAA was the one mounted by women on the south-eastern edge of Delhi, in a neighbourhood called Shaheen Bagh. Braving the bitter Delhi winter, hundreds of Muslim women undertook a continuous sit-in for over a hundred days. They blockaded a portion of Kalindi Kunj Road, a six-lane highway that connects the city to the south-eastern suburb of Noida and onwards to south-west Uttar Pradesh, in a bid to foreground their discontent against the divisive legislation. Over three iridescent months, the home-makers who assembled in this corner of Delhi taught their fellow citizens invaluable lessons about belongingness and membership in the political community.