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Journalism of Courage
July 10: It was another day of morchas and hunger strikes outside the Samrat Hotel at Churchgate today. It was also a day of violence, empty assurances and duty as usual for the policemen attached to the Cuffe Parade police station.
Although most organisations staged a peaceful demonstration, the National Federation for the Blind turned unusually aggressive. About 150 people participated in the morcha, which travelled from Azad Maidan to Mantralaya. The demonstrators were demanding the filling up of reserved posts in the employment sector, reservation for the blind in housing schemes, a fair decision on the issue of blind hawkers, a decision to conduct Public Commission examinations in Braille instead of using a writer among others.
They demanded that Joshi should personally come and address them. When they received no response, they turned violent and tried to break the iron barricades and march to Vidhan Bhavan where the monsoon session of the state legislature is currently on. The 150 policemen stationed there found it difficult to handle the situation. Said a policeman, “It is very difficult to manage blind persons when they turn violent. All of them just rushed at the iron barricades and we had to ensure that they did not hurt themselves.” If they hurt themselves, the police will be blamed, he added.
A virtual fist-fight took place between the police and the demonstrators and loud protest slogans by the blind rent the air for almost half a hour. Some of the more active demonstrators were put in a police vehicle to defuse the charged atmosphere, but in vain. They continued to hurl abuses at the police, calling them government chamchas. After sloganeering against the government continued, the police decided it was better to allow them to demonstrate on the road.
One of the policeman was bitten by a demonstrator, alleged the police, but it was not serious. Later, representatives of the association met Joshi who assured them that their demands would be seriously considered. Joshi assured them that their demands would be implemented in the next three months, and asked them to meet him again after this period if they still had any grievances. Dattatray Jadhav, honorary general secretary of the organisation, who met the chief minister, later tried to pacify the demonstrators, but with little success. The demonstrators, who had travelled there from all over Maharashtra demanded a concrete assurance immediately, saying they had been given such assurances earlier also. Jadhav told the demonstrators to return home, and to prepare themselves for a hunger strike in case the state government did not stick to its promises. This violent demonstartion almost upstaged the peaceful one by the Maharashtra State Sampakalin Workers’ Sangharsha Samiti, which waited all day to meet the chief minister. The secretary R U D Kulkarni said that they would stay back and demand an appointment with Joshi tomorrow.
In another corner sat a lone policeman under a temporary plastic sheet tent. Dhananjay Tukaram from the State Reserve Force in Mumbai was on a dharna to demand residential accomodation as his one year-old son is very ill. He made several representations to the police authorities, but without any success.
