FPJ EDIT— Wanted: A Shaheen Bagh face-saver

FPJ EDIT— Wanted: A Shaheen Bagh face-saver

EditorialUpdated: Thursday, February 13, 2020, 11:01 PM IST
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Protestor show their ink-marked fingers after casting votes for the Delhi Assembly elections, near the site of their peaceful agitation against the Citizenship Act, in Shaheen Bagh. | PTI

Shaheen Bagh in Delhi is looking for a face-saver. Investing in the sit-out on a main arterial road of the capital great republican meanings and purposes, the usual suspects in the secularist-leftist brigade themselves seem tired of lending it active support. With the Government repeatedly asserting that it would not budge an inch on the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, the Muslim women, and the Mullah-Maulvi cabal controlling them from behind, has only two clear options: One, to pack up and go home, or, two, continue regardless. The first will be a sensible course, especially when the Supreme Court too has taken a dim view of a protest causing great public nuisance. Besides, with Arvind Kejriwal, the winner of the Delhi Assembly poll, playing coy on being openly identified with them, though his key lieutenant Amanatullah Khan, an AAP MLA, was the main spirit behind the protest, Shaheen Bagh has reason to feel cheated. Admittedly, the Congress leadership did lend open and strong support in the hope that it would earn the 16 per cent Muslim vote in the Delhi poll. That vote en bloc was polled by AAP since it was clearly the strongest party to beat the BJP. Therefore, even the Congress now sees no reason to bolster the Shaheen Bagh show. Under the circumstances, it is left with little choice but to quietly melt away, sparing the behind-the-scene organisers further money and energy.

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