Clarion India
As of now, students from 18 institutes have joined this collective.
The network will organise protest demonstrations across universities and colleges on March 5 against the new Citizenship law (CAA) which, when coupled with the NRC citizenship test, has the potential to dis-enfranchise swathes of citizens from Muslim minority communities in India.
Read here about an important development, namely the creation of a network of student groups at US universities combatting Hindutva.
They are at 18 colleges/universities and counting.https://t.co/Q6ZPINxEIQ #HoliAgainstHindutva @Holi_A_H
— Audrey Truschke (@AudreyTruschke) February 28, 2020
“Students Against Hindutva (SAH)’s national protests on March 5 will be called A Holi Against Hindutva,” Shreeya Singh, the founder of the network, wrote in an op-ed, adding, “Intending to use a pillar of diasporic student communities — Holi, a festival that celebrates the arrival of spring — to signal our solidarity with those on the front-lines of the resistance. “
She said the protesters will dress in black, as opposed to Holi’s traditional white attire, and will celebrate the festival of colours with just one colour: white. “This stark contrast speaks of the increasingly black-and-white choice between complicity or resistance as the death toll of those opposed to Hindutva continues to rise,” Singh wrote.
The network hopes to continue the resistance against the rising Hindutva aggressiveness in India. “Beyond facilitating resistance and solidarity against Hindu nationalism, we aim to establish a long-term source of educational and institutional knowledge that can be passed through generations within universities,” the op-ed said.
Sahana, a Scripps College senior and executive board member of Students Against Hindutva, is of the opinion that South Asians in the diaspora should accept “a responsibility to act in solidarity with those fighting against the fascist CAA/NRC and continued occupation in Kashmir.”
The network understands that even solidarity has its complications.
In her oped piece, Singh delves into the history of South Asian student activism and talks about how some members of the diaspora launched the 2005 movement that helped revoke Narendra Modi’s visa to US over his failure to stop the deadly 2002 Gujarat riots against Indian Muslims.
Mohit, a student who is part of the network and regularly joins protest demonstrations against CAA and NRC in the US, points out the role the diaspora has played “in creating the evil mammoth of Indian right-wing institutions.”
“If the new diasporic generation wants to rewrite their role, they should actively get out on to the streets to remind the Indian government that they are an important stakeholder,” he is quoted having said.
“The more of us that speak, the less likely history is to repeat itself,” Singh said and urged the diaspora to join them.