‘No’ to peace bond, ‘yes’ to INDIA bloc: Has Neha Bora outsmarted CJP leaders? | India News
NEW DELHI: When Neha Bora recently said “AISA will not be a part of normalising the signing of peace bonds”, she inadvertently highlighted a contrast that the Jantar Mantar 2.0 protests against SIR and “vote chori” had brought to the fore. Neha’s refusal to sign the peace bond before a special executive magistrate and her subsequent challenge to the police move drew an obvious parallel. Did the CJP leaders – Abhijeet Dipke, Ashutosh Ranka and Sourav Das – give in to peace bond pressure easily?“Peace bonds are being weaponised to curb democratic protests. Signing such peace bonds is no less than signing away our democratic right to dissent,” the AISA national president said and claimed that she was detained within 10 minutes of protesting at Mandi House on October 16 and was told that she and other protesters were in breach of peace.“On one side, the Constitution gives us the right to dissent. On the other hand, such peace bonds are invoked only to detain people in the name of breach of peace. Therefore, signing such peace bonds is a principally wrong decision for us. It is no less than signing away our democratic right to dissent,” Bora said defending her decision.Bora has still not signed the bond and is awaiting copies of 6 FIRs cited as her criminal antecedents in peace-bond proceedings. This, after she insisted for all documents relied upon in the show-cause notice seeking execution of her peace bond.Now, let’s rewind to October 10.The CJP’s call for Jantar Mantar 2.0 on October 10 had, as expected, evoked great national interest and anticipation. All eyes were on Abhijeet Dipke and his associates Sourav Das and Ashutosh Ranka, who had in June-July this year led a successful youth mobilisation against NEET paper leak. The CJP-led protests had ensured that Dharmendra Pradhan was forced to resign as Union education minister. After all, they were the new heroes of GenZ, who had left the politicians far behind.But ahead of October 10, the national capital saw an unprecedented clampdown. The Delhi Police closed down anything and everything that could facilitate the movement of protesters to Jantar Mantar. For the CJP leadership, the message was loud and clear – they will not get a free passage, unlike in June when they were allowed to gather and mobilise youth at Jantar Mantar for their protests against NEET paper leak.But October 10 morning started with an anticlimax. The top 3 CJP leaders Abhijeet Dipke, Ashutosh Ranka and Saurav Das travelled together from Mumbai to Delhi and were detained from aircraft as soon as they landed in the national capital. Thousands of protesters who had responded to their calls, braved the police clampdown. They were all detained.The CJP leaders were released a day later after giving an undertaking to maintain public order. Delhi Police said a surety bond of Rs 50,000 was furnished for CJP activists Abhijeet Dipke, Ashutosh Ranka and Saurav Das for maintaining peace and good behaviour for one year, following their preventive arrest on October 10.The CJP leaders made two more attempts to reclaim the streets – when Sourav Das and Ashutosh Ranka tried to reach Jantar Mantar and again when Dipke urged people to join the “Lehra Do Tiranga” march with the national flag at Central Park in Connaught Place.However, they were detained again and made to sign peace bonds to come out of detention. And while the CJP leaders failed to recreate the magic of Jantar Mantar 1.0, AISA leader Neha Bora took the centrestage. The AISA national president was detained 5 times between October 2 and October 11. However, every time she was released, she would come back to the streets and continue with her protests.During the peak of the protests, Neha Bora hogged the headlines for foxing the police. On October 11, Neha Bora announced a gathering at RK Ashram Marg Metro Station around 2:30pm as part of demonstrations heading toward central Delhi and Jantar Mantar.Heavy police deployment and barricades were set up around RK Ashram Marg to prevent demonstrators from moving toward Jantar Mantar. During the confrontation, police mistakenly chased and detained another protester whose face was partially covered, believing her to be Neha Bora.While police attention was focused at RK Ashram Marg, Neha Bora surfaced near Connaught Place (CP), breaching barricades and running alongside fellow demonstrators in a dash that went viral on social media.Little wonder then, when a user on X called Neha Bora “more talented” than CJP founder Abhijeet Dipke and described her as a “complete GenZ icon”, Dipke responded simply: “I agree.” The X user had posted: “Maturity is realizing Neha Bora is more talented than Abhijeet Dipke. A complete GenZ icon with an absolutely ridiculous aura.” It was a comparison that manifested all along the “vote chori” protests.Neha Bora was on the streets every time she was released from detention by the police. She was everywhere – with the CJP leadership, the social activists and also the politicians. When Rahul Gandhi chose to walk behind her during one of the protest marches of INDIA bloc, it spoke volumes about the impact she had made with her street politics. Clearly, the campaign against “vote chori” had put the spotlight on Neha Bora, even as the CJP struggled to find their way to the centre stage of the protests.For the CJP, it was a harsh realisation that a lot had changed between July and October. Unlike the anti-NEET paper leak protests in June-July, the Congress-led INDIA bloc this time around were already on the streets demanding resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. Interestingly, while the INDIA bloc’s original protest schedule had only one announced street protest on October 6, the group returned back to the streets four days in a row till October 9, which was a day before the announced CJP protest.The CJP and the Congress had stayed away from each other during the anti-NEET protests. After Jantar Mantar 1.0 was over, the ‘cockroaches’ carried out their own campaigns in different states, while the Congress shifted focus to protests against SIR and CEC Gyanesh Kumar.
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Abhijeet Dipke has announced that he has no political plans and would prefer to keep CJP as a pressure group. So when CJP announced support for INDIA bloc’s November 1 rally, it set tongues wagging about their political ambitions.With CJP’s Jantar Mantar 2.0 not shaping out as they would have hoped, perhaps its leadership should take a leaf out of Saurav Das’s advice on X to a Congress “soldier” who had questioned why youth Congress and NSUI activists were being detained as soon as they hit the streets and cockroaches were allowed to roam free. Responding to him, CJP co-founder Saurav Das had then said: “if u guys r detained immediately, then u must rethink ur strategy. don’t blame others for ur failures.”The context of that remark was different and CJP’s Jantar Mantar 2.0 campaign was in no way a failure, but Sourav’s take on “rethinking strategy” perhaps holds true for the cockroaches at present.
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