By Hisham ul Wahab P, TwoCircles.net
Transcription of the Speech by Aysha Renna, Student Leader of Jamia Millia Islamia, at Protest Public Meeting Against CAA & NRC organised by the United Muslim Action Committee on 21 December 2019 at Darussalam, Hyderabad.
In the name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful.
Assalamualikum
I would like to extend my Salam to all martyrs who lent their life in the struggle against the terror Sangh regime across the country. On this occasion, I would also like to thank the organisers for inviting us for this mass movement and I am so happy with the support that you are showing to us.
I, Aysha Renna, a post-graduate history student of Jamia Millia Islamia, am standing before you representing the thousands and thousands of students who are actively participating in the protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act and the National Register of Citizenship. People call me an icon and the face of protest. But I am not the real Icon and the real face. I became the icon only because mine, Ladeeda Farzana’s and Shaheen Abdulla’s video became viral. It was last Sunday (December 15, 2019), police stepped into our campus, attacked the students in the library, and thrashed the students who were offering Namaz in the Masjid. Have you ever in the history heard of police boots raiding inside the library? Have you ever heard of a brutal attack on the students inside the campus? But under the Modi regime, all are watching that kind of things. My salutes to all those brave hearts who are the defenders of the dignity and self-esteem of the fellows in the Jamia Millia Islamia and Aligarh Muslim University.
The Modi regime says that they are here to empower Muslim women through various acts like theTriple Talaq bill. But I want to ask the BJP leadership, by beating up Muslim women are you going to empower us?
I would like to bring to your notice the hate campaign that is going against me and Ladeeda Farzana. It was mainly implemented by a well organised IT team of the Sangh Parivar. This was the same IT team who criticized the Unnao rape victim, who criticised Fatima, who criticised everybody who stood and who raised their voices against the BJP Sang atrocities. But I am sure that all their efforts are going to be in vain. Because this struggle is not that of Aysha Renna and Ladeeda Farzana, it is neither the struggle of Aligarh Muslim University nor of Jamia Millia Islamia. This is of the people of the whole India. We know that the constitution begins with ‘we the people’ and the struggle is representing all the people all over India. We are here to protect the constitution against all Hindutva agendas which the BJP government is planning to implement.
I met Chandra Shekhar Azad Ravan on the steps of Jama Masjid. The Bhim Army chief was leading the protest against the CAA there. He was the same guy who took to the streets outside Delhi Police Headquarters on the early hours of sixteenth December 2019 to demand justice to the students of Jamia. Now he is under the detention of the Delhi police. I, on behalf of all those who have gathered here, demand the immediate release of Chandrasekhar Azad and others who have been detained illegally across the country. It is this kind of solidarities that add fuel to this movement. The solidarity of the marginalized which defines the politics of coming generation, those marginalised includes Muslim, Adivasi, Dalit and other minorities of the country.
My speech would be incomplete without speaking of the National Register of Citizenship that is NRC. During the discussion of CAA in the parliament Home minister Amit Shah reiterated a nationwide NRC will be implemented soon. The NRC and CAA are complementary to each other. There are recent news reports that the work of a countrywide NRC has already begun under the mask of National Population Register that is NPR. I request to the Chief Ministers of the non-BJP ruling states to stop the procedure of NPR since its intentions are ambiguous.
I have seen folks in our struggle being suppressed. To them I say, I am coming from Delhi, a city where you can see a lot of forts and monuments. These are reminiscence of a truth. The truth that the autocratic regime even after reaching the zenith of their glory, would fall one day; the truth that the Pharaoh drowned to death, the truth that Hitler had to commit suicide, the truth that Mussolini was killed by his people. It is for this state of truth and justice our struggles are on and the ultimate success will be ours, In Sha Allah (God willing).
I conclude with an Urdu poem:
“Haq vo insaf ki bekhouf himayat ki he
Ye bagaavat he tho hamne bagaavat kee he”
[We have stood for truth and Justice – If this is resistance then yes we have resisted]
Assalamualikum.
