Shabana Azmi claims authorities tried to blame students at CJP protest: ‘I was right there’

Shabana Azmi said that despite being “full of rage and anger”, the students were determined that this was going to be a non-violent protest. Shabana said that she saw 15-year-old kids showing a lot of courage at the protest. She echoed the demands of the students who wanted to be heard and was surprised that no one had a dialogue with them.

‘They will bring in paramilitary forces’

She also said that even though the protest site had been cleared on Monday, but if it continues on Tuesday, she had heard that the paramilitary forces could be brought in to control the students. “Well, we have now heard that today they’ve said that we’re going to clear the place, but we have heard that tomorrow if there is any gathering at all, they are going to turn it violent and then bring in the paramilitary forces and make it into a really violent thing. Is this any way of behaving?”

Upon being asked if there were any anti-social elements involved in the protest, Shabana Azmi said that in any protest that takes place, anti-social elements often try to take advantage of the situation. “We were prepared for that, we knew that would happen. But what is still inexplicable is when two of the representatives went to JP Nadda, he only asked them to write what their grievances were, spent 10 minutes with them, and then sent them away—did not have a dialogue with them. What is this? Why can’t they have a dialogue with the students?”

Shabana Azmi further insisted that the students were demanding educational reforms, and their demands were not limited to the resignation of Dharmendra Pradhan. She also said that there were jammers for phones at the protest site, and even the mic was unplugged for a little while.

Shabana Azmi, Javed Akhtar wrote a letter to the PM on July 15

Shabana was also asked about her political affiliations and she clarified that she has never been involved with any political party, and does not plan to do so in future as well. She shared that previously, on July 15, she and her husband, lyric writer Javed Akhtar, wrote a letter to the Prime Minister about the issue. Both Shabana and Javed have been members of the Rajya Sabha as presidential nominees.

“On July 15, both Javed and I wrote a letter to the Prime Minister, which I will share with you, in which we said that we are appealing to you as concerned citizens and as former members of the Rajya Sabha, and we have no intention of going to social media. We are appealing to you as individuals, and all we are asking is – please initiate a dialogue with them,” she said and added that she was told that they would get a reply in two days. However, when she did not get a reply even after four days, she decided to go public with her support for the students. “Our intention was not to draw attention to ourselves; we have to draw attention to these young students who’ve come forward with so much courage. I’ve never seen something like that in my life,” she said.

On Monday, Shabana took to social media to share videos and pictures from the protest site as she and Prakash Raj both stood with the students.

Sharing a video, Shabana wrote, “Climbing up with the help of young colleagues to the protest site at #Jantar Mantar to demand reforms within our educational system and an overhaul of the entire system. Allocate 6 percent of GDP to education , public health and women’s empowerment to measure the success of our country.”