People's Democracy

     Chennai Police Attack SFI Demo On Iraq

K Deepanjan

ON July 8, 2004, the Chennai police cracked down on a peaceful demonstration held by the Student’s Federation of India (SFI) in front of the American consulate in Chennai protesting the illegal occupation of Iraq by the US. The police roughly manhandled and later arrested members of the SFI  for participating in the demonstration. Many students suffered bruises and were left with torn shirts and chappals.

The Chennai police did not even spare reporters covering this event. They, along with the security officials of the American consulate, prevented any photographs being taken of their crackdown. However, when Gavaskar, a reporter of Theekathir daily newspaper, dared to capture the police brutality on his film, he was attacked. The policemen tried to snatch away his camera. Even though he showed his identity card, inspector of police tried to pull out the film roll from his camera. In order to safeguard the film roll, Gavaskar started to run. He was chased by the police for about a kilometer and then arrested. He was taken to a nearby police station and after detaining him for about an hour, he was released.

Meanwhile, the assistant commissioner of police, Shanmuga Rajeshwaran, and inspector of police, Tamizhselvan, who arrived at the scene ordered for the arrest of the students who were protesting peacefully. The astonishing reason given was that the place where the students were standing was US property and that the demonstration was illegal!

This created a row between the police officials and SFI leaders. In the ensuing tussle, police forcefully arrested the protestors, among whom included SFI state president, G Selva, vice president K A Venmathi, district president Murugan, secretary Lenin, Kumar, Rajesh, Praveen, Che Guevara, Selvam and others.

The SFI called for the demonstration in view of the attempt by the US to project the installation of a corrupt, puppet government in Iraq as a genuine transfer of sovereignty. The utter contempt displayed by the US administration for all international laws – the bombing of hospitals and schools during the war and now the inhuman torture of prisoners at Abu Ghraib – was strongly condemned by the SFI.

Terming the ongoing resistance as a “guerilla war being waged by the freedom fighters of Iraq”, the SFI demanded that US should leave Iraq immediately.