At Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh, TV journalist manhandled, camera broken by CAA protesters

New Delhi: Noted television journalist Deepak Chaurasia and his team was attacked at the Shaheen Bagh protest site on Friday, where hundreds of people have been sitting on protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).

Deepak Chaurasia was reporting about the ongoing protest from the spot. It’s then a couple of people came from behind, heckled him while he was doing his job. Chaurasia persisted with his reporting but the goons didn’t back off and rather went a step ahead. They manhandled him while trying to block his reporting and in the process, also broke the TV camera. Some other members of the camera team were also roughed up by the protesters.

There were no police personnel in sight. Also, no one among the demonstrators stood up to oppose the unruly elements who went on rampage and blocked the TV scribe from doing his job. A police complaint has been lodged, following which DCP South East Delhi has assured of action against perpetrators.

सुन रहे हैं कि संविधान ख़तरे में है, सुन रहे हैं कि लड़ाई प्रजातंत्र को बचाने की है! जब मैं शाहीन बाग की उसी आवाज़ को देश को दिखाने पहुँचा तो वहाँ मॉब लिंचिंग से कम कुछ नहीं मिला! #CAAProtests #ShaheenBagh pic.twitter.com/EhJxfWviTp

— Deepak Chaurasia (@DChaurasia2312) January 24, 2020

Protest or Staged Demonstration?

For more than 40 days, people have been sitting on protest and holding demonstrations against the newly amended Citizenship law. They have blocked arterial road connecting Delhi and Noida, causing major problem for daily commuters. They claim that their protest is peaceful and it’s rather a ‘public revolution’ against despotic policies of govt but today’s incident raises serious questions.

A video also went viral recently, claiming that the CAA protest is staged as protesters are being paid Rs 500 for daily demonstrations.