Koramangala is one of the trendiest areas of Bengaluru. The road from Nexus mall to the National Games village is an important road in the area. It has several posh eating joints, a few pubs, and street vendors selling food. A few years ago several street vendors in that road were evicted by the traffic police without any notice or reason. When one of the inspectors was asked for a reason, he said that it was because many IT professionals travel via that road to either Whitefield or electronic city and vendors block these Important tax-paying professionals. It is to be noted that evicted vendors occupied a space of 6 feet on a 18 feet footpath not obstructing traffic and in fact what took space on the road were parked private vehicles. This is the general attitude in Bengaluru – that IT-BT professionals are most important and everyone else, especially the working class don’t really matter.
When working classes protest in Bengaluru, the media sometimes focus on the issues raised and sometimes focus only on traffic which may get affected as a result! Sometimes there is no reportage either. For instance, when over a lakh members of the Dalit community protested in Bangalore against the removal of the portrait of Dr.Ambedkar in a Republic day function, barely any English media reported on it. This bias is most strongly illustrated by what happened in March 2021 when Anganwadi workers and state run road transport corporation employees held protests and rallies in the city seeking a pay hike ahead of the state budget on March 8. Newspapers reported that the protests caused a traffic jam.
Shortly later, a sitting judge of the high court writes to the Chief Justice highlighting how the protest caused a traffic jam. On the basis of this letter, the High Court initiated a suo-moto case to regulate protests in Bengaluru. We do not hear of judges writing letters saying why Anganwadi workers are protesting on the road, or why street vendors are being evicted in violation of the law. But here, because traffic got jammed, a sitting judge wrote a letter and the court initiated a PIL.
During the course of the PIL being heard, without any consideration to the citizens’ fundamental rights of assembly or right to free speech, the Karnataka High court passed an interim order disallowing protests anywhere except freedom park and prohibiting all rallies! A constitutional court which is supposed to protect our fundamental rights instead passed an order which took away our rights.
The result of this order shrunk democracy in Bengaluru. The order resulted in many cases being filed against several marginalised communities for engaging in their constitutional right to protest. This includes workers for the traditional May Day rally, farmers protesting land acquisition in Devanahalli, Dalit activists seeking internal reservation, Powrakarmikas protesting for their rights, and residents of Malleswaram for organising a walk on the Sankey flyover issue. As a result of this order the pride march which happens every year in November was also disallowed, negating an important space of self-expression for the LGBTQIA community.
This order emptied the right to protest of its very content as protests often have meaning specific to an area. Farmers of Devanahalli protested the acquisition of their lands in Devanahalli. They had a case slapped against them since they didn’t protest in Freedom Park! The same became true of Malleswaram’s residents. If people are not permitted to protest at the place where the protest is relevant, the purpose of the protest is completely lost. Why should people be forced to travel to Freedom Park to protest?
What is most distressing is that no political party resisted this interim order. Before the final order of the High Court was passed, the police themselves brought out a new set of guidelines to regulate protests – the Licensing and Regulation of Protests, Demonstrations and Protest Marches (Bengaluru City) Order,2021(1). No political party resisted this either. As civil society we must also introspect as there was no civil society protest against this order as well. Why did we let the court and police restrict our rights without conducting any public protests? It is only such protests that have made India the world’s largest democracy. The protests after the 2012 Delhi gang-rape saw a strengthening of anti-rape laws; protests by garment workers resulted in new PF rules being scrapped; Anganwadi and ASHA workers have got pay raises only after protests; the farmers’ protests led to the withdrawal of the farm laws. Bangalore owes much of its magnificent green cover only because of ordinary people protesting the arbitrary felling of trees. The Modi government’s plan to introduce NRC- CAA was also stopped only because of the wide protests.
Even though as civil society we did not act when the restrictive orders came in place, we are now moving to reclaim lost ground. Last month a civil society campaign ‘Horatada Hakkigaagi Janandolana’ was launched to get back the right to freedom of protesting. Comprising farmers groups, women’s groups, left and Dalit groups, student unions and several progressive individuals, this campaign aims to get back the right to protest. In addition to online and offline signature drives, members of the campaign have also met the Chief Minister to apprise him of the issue. We do hope that this government which promised to restore the democratic ethos of Karnataka will ensure that citizens again have a right to protest. If not, rest assured citizens will hit the streets again and not rest till the fundamental right to protest is upheld.
1. Licensing and Regulation of Protests, Demonstrations and Protest Marches (Bengaluru City) Order, 2021 (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1tUvhrSNn4Bnv9uxLlyMjW_VskisW13kN/view)
