Some recent protests that were successful
Jalikattu protests: A few years ago, the Supreme Court put a ban on the traditional bull-taming sport Jallikattu after years of complaints about animal cruelty by PETA, the ban was not accepted by the people of Tamil Nadu. The protestors said the sport is central to their cultural identity. The protest turned violent when police tried to evict the protestors. Around 2,00,000 people came out on the street near Chennai’s Marina beach to show solidarity. Later, the Tamil Nadu Government legalised Jallikattu.
Jan Lok Pal protests of 2011: The hunger-strike initiated by social worker Anna Hazare in 2011 to demand an ombudsman against corruption witnessed widespread support from people across all walks of life. The protests led to the resignation of then agriculture minister Sharad Pawar from the group of minister appointed to review the Lokpal bill draft. After the agitation, the government passed the Lokpal bill, but again, it did not exactly live up to the expectations of the protestors.
Nirbhaya movement of 2012: The 2012 Delhi Gang Rape saw one of the most angry reactions from people who were very clear on expressing that they have had enough. After the incident, thousands of people came out on streets to protest in several parts of the country. The movement also created a stir in social media where people changed their display picture to a black dot and tens of thousands of people signed a petition protesting the incident. Taking the movement into consideration, the government at the centre and various states announced several steps to ensure the safety of women. However, the way authorities went about implementation of these measures was again, not exactly what the protestors expected.
Some street protests
that failed
Anna Hazare’s second hunger strike: Citing that the Lokpal bill was toothless, Anna Hazare again took up hunger strike in 2019 for the same demands he had made in 2011, but this time, the protest received no response from politicians or people. This happened partly because people such as Kiran Bedi, Arwind Kejriwal, Yogendra Yadav etc who had stood with Anna in 2011 were now scattered, and the country too had changed socially in nine years time.
Farmers long march in Maharashtra: Kisan Rally or Kisan Long March was a large scale protest march by farmers in the Indian state of Maharashtra, organized by the All India Kisan Sabha, the peasants front of the Communist Party of India (Marxist). The protests took place just before the Lok Sabha polls, but the state government was able to minimise the impact of the protests as it provided protestors with basic facilities along their march route, generating goodwill for itself, and later gave an assurance to act on its demands, thus avoiding a showdown. The protests failed to have any impact on national elections as well as the state elections that followed.
JNU fee hike protests: The more recent protests by JNU students protesting the hike in hostel fees resulted in the University administration partially rolling back the hike. However, the protests were known more for incidents of police lathi charge on the students, and many voices were raised on social media against the protesting students.
What limits the success
of street protests?
Slacktivism:As many have noted, social media can both facilitate and undermine the formation of more effective political parties. We are familiar with the power of social media to identify, recruit, mobilize, and coordinate supporters as well as to fundraise. But we also know that clicktivism and slacktivism undermine real political work by creating the feel-good illusion that clicking “like’’ on a Facebook page or tweeting incendiary messages from the comfort of one’s computer or smartphone is equivalent to the activism that brings change.
Lack of patience: With social media making it easy to come together and protest, often than not it simply fizzles out. This is because the work of following up on protesters’ demands and undertaking the complex and time-consuming work of negotiations lobbying does not happen properly.
An experienced state: With protests becoming a more frequent phenomenon, the state has been using different ways including monitoring the Internet to prevent protests from happening. Additionally, security forces around the world have modernised and improved their riot control tactics.
All things said and done, the value of people’s voice is an integral part of democracy. Even so, whether new ways must be found to voice disagreement on ke issues with the state, or and how will the conventional street protests evolve in the coming times is a topic that merits a good debate.
