The ongoing farmers’ agitation along the Delhi borders reached a crescendo today when the protesters ran riot on the streets of the national capital during their Tractor rally.
As protesters veered away from the pre-decided route, the police forces charged them with batons and fired teargas to try to disperse the crowds. The demonstrators resorted to vandalism, destroying vehicles on their march into Delhi. Social media platforms were awash with shocking visuals of lumpen protesters vandalising DTC buses at ITO area.
Scores of rampaging demonstrators breached the police barricades around the capital and stormed the grounds of Delhi’s historic Red Fort as tumultuous and violent scenes cast a pal over the country’s Republic Day celebrations. The protesting demonstrators also waved a Sikh flag alongside the Indian flag at the historic monument.
Left-leaning liberals defend the vandalism and violence by ‘farmers’
As protesters held the Red Fort at siege and unfurled a religious flag at the site, the usual suspects went on an overdrive to justify the anarchy that was unravelling on the 71st Republic Day of the world’s largest democracy during the tractor rally.
Propagandist Akash Banerjee attempted to defend the violence that erupted in Delhi and pinned the blame of the same on the government. In a snarky tweet, Banerjee implied that the protests couldn’t remain peaceful because the government did not cave into the demands of the protesters.
Another left-liberal preemptively moved to disassociate the ruckus by the ‘farmers’ in tractor rally with the storming of the US Capitol Hill a couple of weeks back.
Rohini Singh came to the defense of the riotous ‘farmers’ mob, making an absurd comparison with the protests that swept the national capital in the aftermath of the Nirbhaya rape case. Singh stated that the demonstrators had then entered the Rashtrapati Bhavan but the TV anchors had then not outraged over the protests.
Another undistinguished liberal, Nikhil Taneja, had no quarrel with how the protesters vandalised and ran riot in Delhi. Instead, he painted the government as the oppressor and held them responsible for the disorder.
Liberals draw false equivalence between Ram Mandir Tableau and hoisting of Sikh flag at Red Fort
Some of the left-leaning liberals made a ridiculous comparison of the unfurling of a religious flag at the Red Fort with the Uttar Pradesh government’s Ram Mandir Tableau in the Republic Day parade to defend the desecration of the Red Fort by the protesters.
Newslaundry journalist Manisha Pande also defended the defilement of the Red Fort, saying that the Indian flag was not disrespected when the protesters hoisted the Sikh religious flags at the iconic monument.
Journalist Harinder Baweja was upset that people were condemning the illegal unfurling of Nishan Sahib flag at the Red Fort and not the Ram Mandir Tableau by the Uttar Pradesh government. According to her, the UP government’s Ram Mandir Tableau in R-Day parade was as condemnable as the unlawful hoisting of a religious flag at the Red Fort.
Similarly, another lesser-know liberal who goes by the name of Neha Dixit, supported the hoisting of a religious flag by an unruly mob at Red Fort. She stated that since the government could display Ram Mandir Tableau at the R-Day parade, protesting vandals could also unfurl Nishan Saheb flag on Red Fort.
The entire saga of the Red Fort siege laid bare the innate tendencies of the liberal intelligentsia. It demonstrated that the liberal opposition to mob violence and vandalism is not absolute. Rather, it is convenient and flexible, based on the identities of the ‘victims’ and the ‘oppressors’. Since the protesters here were protesting against the Modi government, liberals had no qualms with the violence perpetrated by them.
Not only did liberals had no problems with the protesters going on a rampage in the national capital, they even unapologetically defended their vandalism and tried to legitimise the violence as a fallout of government’s refusal to agree with the protesters’ demands.
Meanwhile, 83 policemen were injured during the violence that ensued. And even more horrifying was the fact that hundreds of children/artists who had participated in the Republic Day celebrations were stranded at the Red Fort when the monument was held at siege. They were crying and terrified before they were rescued by the Delhi Police.
