Renewed efforts are being made to associate Akshat Awasthi with the ABVP even after OpIndia busted the false narrative in a series of reports published yesterday. The latest narrative appears to be that more images and videos are surfacing which supposedly ‘proves’ Awasthi’s association with the ABVP.
As more videos/photos identifying Akshat Awasthi with ABVP tumble out, my humble Sunday suggestion to student body:Why not just accept some ABVP members may have been involved in Jan 5 violence and realise ‘revenge’ attacks are unacceptable. End denial, troll attacks! #JNUTapes
— Rajdeep Sardesai (@sardesairajdeep) January 12, 2020
Under such circumstances, there’s a need to understand the chronology of events here, or as the popular meme says, “Aap chronology samjhiye“. It’s important to remember here that the ABVP has rejected all allegations that Awasthi is associated with them in any manner. Furthermore, Awasthi has himself denied later on that he was associated with the ABVP and admitted that he was lying in the ‘sting’ and that he was merely boasting. Thus, it is clearly incumbent upon Rahul Kanwal and India Today to produce conclusive evidence of Awasthi’s membership of ABVP. So far, there hasn’t been any.
The new visual evidence that apparently ‘prove’ Awasthi’s association with the ABVP shows him hanging out with some ABVP members and him raising some slogans with the ABVP from the month of November. Unfortunately for the ones making these suggestions, this isn’t valid evidence to prove Awasthi’s political allegiance in the first week of January 2020 when violence escalated at the JNU campus.
However, all of these images date back to November. And two months is a long long time. Student politics is a lot like conventional politics, only much worse as the worst aspects of conventional politics are amplified at this level. Therefore, whatever Awasthi’s loyalties were in November cannot be construed as an accurate representation of his political orientation in January of 2020. Fortunately for us, we do have some evidence to indicate what Awasthi’s political loyalties were on the day violence escalated in January.
In a video released by ABVP, Awasthi can be clearly spotted with Leftists who were assaulting ABVP students. The Police kept the left and ABVP factions separated and stood between them in a row, and Akshat could be clearly seen on the side of the Left. Now, it is conclusive evidence that Awasthi was clearly with the Left during the time violence escalated at JNU.
Akshat Awasthi can clearly be seen behind the left activists from 6 sec to 9 sec in the video while AISA’s Dolan Samantha can be seen assaulting ABVP karyakartas. Police is bordering ABVP and Left. Does @rahulkanwal have the guts to show this on air? #LeftBehindJNUViolence pic.twitter.com/mkDhb72icR
— ABVP (@ABVPVoice) January 11, 2020
Could Awasthi have been a part of ABVP some time in the past? Certainly, but not a shred of evidence has been produced to prove even that. Do Awasthi’s pictures from the past with ABVP karyakartas prove his association with the ABVP in the first week of January? Certainly not. The only conclusion that could be drawn is the fact that Awasthi is politically promiscuous, like a lot of people in politics usually are. Will it be fair to blame the BJP for the reprehensible conduct of Navjot Singh Sidhu ever since he joined the Congress party? It’s a similar situation here at best.
Again, we have to remember, it is India Today which has to prove that Akash Awasthi was a part of the ABVP when violence escalated at JNU in the first week of January. They made the claim and they blamed the ABVP, therefore, it is India Today and Rahul Kanwal who must produce evidence that Awasthi was an ABVP member during the time period in question. Furthermore, images from November 2019 that purportedly show Awasthi as an ABVP member do not discredit visuals from January 2020 which clearly indicate that he was one of the Leftists. The fact that the Lutyens Cabal is ignoring the January 2020 evidence only shows that they are not interested in the truth, they only care about politics.
Awasthi’s past political inclinations do not matter. Just like Shiv Sena’s past political stance does not mean that it isn’t one of the ‘secular’ parties now. It took two weeks for Shiv Sena to change from fascists to upholders of constitutional values. Two months is enough time for Awasthi to turn Left if he was even a part of the ABVP, to begin with. The only thing that matters is his affiliations during the January JNU fracas. It is only that we should be concerned about. And so far, despite the loud proclamations by the media, not a single shred of evidence has been produced that proves he is/was an ABVP member.
