In a move to counter the silent march of writers against the Sahitya Akademi on Friday, another group of people staged a protest alleging that the decision by authors to return awards was “motivated by their vested interests”. They demanded that the literary body should not buckle under pressure from the writers.
Alleging that “these very people” had earlier appealed to voters not to give mandate to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the protesters, led by Joint Action group of Nationalist Minded Artists and Thinkers (JANMAT) and joined by BJP’s youth wing ABVP, also submitted a memorandum to the Akademi questioning the motive of the writers.
The protest coincided with the silent march by writers of different languages from Sri Ram Centre at Safdar Hashmi Marg to the Sahitya Akademi building, demanding that the Akademi pass a resolution pledging to take stern steps to safeguard freedom of speech and right to dissent of the writers.
JANMAT made an appeal to the Sahitya Akademi to maintain its autonomous nature and not come under pressure “from the very same writers who had earlier appealed to the people of the country to not give their mandate to Prime Minister Narendra Modi”.
Sangeet Natak Akademi executive member Nalini Kamilini said, “Art, literature and music are the assets of our culture. It is our strength. These protests show they are motivated. If it was not so then why they didn’t do so for previous incidents.”
One of the members of the counter protest Malini Awasthi, also an executive member of the Sangeet Natak Akademi, said, “I find this to be 100 per cent political and socially motivated. The writers and artists should come together to keep India united and not create a divide, instead what they are doing is creating a divide… I am really surprised at their collective memory when it chose to react on certain issues. Where do they go for convenient sleep when other unfortunate incidents happenedIJ How many of them have written on Kashmiri Pandits, Safdar Hashmi or the Muzaffarnagar riotsIJ” she asked.
At least 35 writers from across the country had over the past few weeks announced their decision to return their Sahitya Akademi awards and stepped down from official Akademi positions to protest the “rising intolerance” in the country.