Movement like Bangladesh in Kolkata

Just as the quota movement in Bangladesh eventually turned into an anti-government movement, the situation has arisen in Kolkata.

When the protest against the rape and murder of a young doctor while on duty at a government hospital in Kolkata, India started, a few days before that, a mass uprising took place in neighboring Bangladesh. The Prime Minister had to leave the country. The government has fallen.

The people of West Bengal are now chanting the slogans they heard in that movement in Dhaka. For example, 'We want justice', 'Point one, demand one, resignation of the chief minister!'

BJP, CPM and Congress have joined the people.

The junior doctors went on a protest march to the state health department headquarters, while BJP leaders sat on dharna at Shyambazar near RG Kar Hospital.

Yesterday, Wednesday afternoon, the BJP held a rally, where there were placards similar to the slogans of the Bangladesh movement, 'Dafa Ek, Daabi Ek, Resignation of the Chief Minister.'

Calcutta University students and alumni gathered on College Street. A large procession of Congress leaders and workers went towards Lalbazar, the headquarters of the Kolkata Police. The police blocked the way of the marchers. When they tried to break the barricade, they were arrested.

People from the sports world also took to the road with the slogan 'We want justice for RG Kar'. There were more marches-gathering-protests from Wednesday afternoon till night.

Although the Supreme Court asked the protesting doctors to end their strike and return to work, the students and junior doctors of RG Kar Medical College have decided that after seeing the 'status report' to be submitted by the Central Bureau of Investigation and the state government to the Supreme Court on Thursday (August 22), they will next Fix the program.

Not only in Kolkata, not only in West Bengal, protests are also happening in other cities of India. Doctors protest. Continued protest.

'If Bangladesh can do it, we can't?'

Calcutta publisher Dipayan Dhar said, 'The movement going on in West Bengal over the RG tax issue is definitely influenced by the movement of students in Bangladesh. But the way the movement is happening now is an expression of anger accumulated in people's minds for a long time.

A section of protestors in Kolkata say that the biggest similarity between the two movements in West Bengal and Bangladesh is that common people spontaneously took to the streets without political flags.

Aditi Roy took the initiative in the 'Night Road Occupancy' programme. In his words, 'night road occupation programs have a long history. This movement first took place in Philadelphia, USA. This We Want Justice slogan was the slogan of that movement. But of course, many people may not know that history. Perhaps the movement of Bangladesh has inspired a large part of them to take to the streets that night.'

He says that Bangladesh has shown the way in the way that ordinary people are spontaneously taking to the streets almost every day without any party flag, regardless of party affiliation, to protest against the incident of RG tax. They have shown that it is possible! Many people thought that if Bangladesh can do it, why can't we?'

pent-up anger

In the words of Dipayan Dhar, 'The incident of rape and murder of a doctor while on duty in a premier institute in Kolkata has angered people, but beyond that, there was an anger in the public against the state. People were looking for a place to vent that pent-up anger. I think that's what came out through the protest of this incident. That happened in Bangladesh too.'

Soumitra Dastidar, a documentary film maker from Kolkata, who keeps an eye on the politics of the three countries, thinks that the pattern of the movements that are happening not only in Bangladesh, but also in India and Pakistan is very similar.

He said, 'If you look at the main tone of the movement in the three countries, everything is an attempt to break the immobility, and in all cases it is a movement of the young generation. Crowds of people are taking to the streets everywhere, many of whom are young and many of whom have never been involved in any form of politics. A spontaneous public awakening is seen everywhere. People are not sitting and waiting for what a party will do, what will be demanded.'

In his words, 'the voice of system change coming from these movements, going beyond the familiar narrative of political parties, has been shown by the movement started by the students of Bangladesh.'

What is Trinamool Congress saying?

Trinamool Congress chief West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee recently said, 'The Bangladeshi Prime Minister has been ousted by the agitators of that country—the Calcutta agitators are also encouraged by this.'

Professor Manojit Mondal, one of the spokespersons of Trinamool Congress, says, 'The politics that the opposition parties will play on this hellish incident is to be known. But apart from that, the demand for the resignation of the Chief Minister is rising from the common people, it was not noticed before.'

He said, 'The incident that is being sought, the investigation that is going on so far, or the arrests, have all been done by the police of Mamatar's government. It has been more than ten days since the CBI got the investigation. Have they made any progress? So why will Mamata resign? The Prime Minister, who is sitting at the head of the ministry under which the CBI comes under, should demand his resignation.'

The fact that common people are also demanding the resignation of the Chief Minister is being noticed in various posts on social media and chats in tea shops.

Source: BBC Bangla

Bangladesh /SBT