Wrestlers’ protest is changing the grammar of agitation

Apart from the sports fraternity who have been selective in expressing solidarity, the khaps were the only social networks easily accessible to these protesting athletes

It has been more than a month and the protesting wrestlers are yet to get justice. While the Narendra Modi-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government continues to shield Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, the accused Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP, the protestors have been gaining support from different quarters.

The same protestors who once denied CPI(M) leader Brinda Karat to speak at their protest, with the fear of it being ‘politicised’, have now changed their strategies, and have become more welcoming towards any kind of genuine support and solidarity. What made them rethink?

Apart from the numerous organisations representing workers, farmers, women, students, and youth that have lend their support to the wrestlers, the most interesting has been the support extended by the khaps. How do these different political and social entities that even have contradictory positioning on several issues find common ground here?

Against the continuous attack on the Constitution and basic tenants of democracy by the BJP government, two sustained nonpartisan, multi-party, civil society movements have been relatively successful in the recent past: the movement against the NRC/CAA, and the one against the farm laws. In both these cases apart from the political/ideological organisations, the community-based mobilisation at a pan India level has pushed the routine protest space beyond its usual constituency.

Be it the Muslim women of Shaheen Bagh or the Sikh women farmers at different protest sites, the content and visuals of these protests saw a performative change, of being more inclusive, and of being more horizontal. The ongoing wrestlers’ protest and its mobilisation strategy must be seen as the continuation of this pattern, changing the grammar and vocabulary of agitation and resistance.

How do the khaps — known for their regressive role in various cases of self-choice marriages within the clan or gotra — become an ally in a movement demanding gender justice? One must not forget that the khaps played a definite role in the historic farmer movement of 2020-21, where it broke its traditional form of operation and perhaps for the first time allowed women to speak in many of the Mahapanchayats it had organised. The number of women mobilised by the khaps might be less than the men, yet it is a sizeable amount if seen contextually. It was gratifying to see women from different part of Haryana, and Rajasthan who were mobilised by these khaps joining the march from Jantar Mantar to India Gate holding their children in one hand and a candle in the other.

Rather than limiting khaps as reactionary feudal bodies, they may be understood as traditional institutions of maintaining the agrarian social order. Now with advent of the neo-liberal State this agrarian social order is under threat; the lingering agrarian distress is coupled up with corporatisation of agriculture, making the old-world on the verge of collapse. Quite naturally such social orders are forced to negotiate with modernity to survive. The farm laws could alter their power dynamics by displacing them from the land altogether, so to resist such efforts, khaps took upon the responsibility of building broad solidarity, twisting and relaxing their norms, and even submitting to several progressive demands.

‘In the case of the wrestlers’ protest, apart from the sports fraternity who have been selective in expressing solidarity, the khaps were the only social networks easily accessible to these athletes. This protest must not be reduced to a Jat agitation — because the khap representatives that spoke at the protest reiterated that they came from several different castes and clans, including the Gujjars, Thakurs, and Yadavs. The involvement of Bhim Army leader Chandrasekhar Azad and the participation of his party, further blurs the claim of this being a sectarian protest, and may open the window for a bigger socio-political dynamic.’

One may draw a critique that the narrative against sexual harassment in this protest is still very much embedded in the masculine protectionist framework, where women are continuously referred as ‘sisters and daughters’, but not as individuals. It is also true that the class-based organisations and the women groups that keep on bringing in the notion of equal rights, that question patriarchy, and try to place this as a larger attack of the Hindutva neo-liberal State against its rightful democratic citizens, are not going unnoticed or unheard. Protests are also sites for learning and unlearning — while one might learn about a new world view, the other might lose some of its preconceived notions and stereotypes.

(Dipsita Dhar is an activist, currently pursuing her Phd from the Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi. Twitter: @DharDipsita)

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.