How ‘Police Brutality’ Narrative Peddled To Generate Sympathy For Violent Jamia Protesters Is Rapidly Unravelling

Soon after the passage of Citizenship Amendment Bill (CAB), Delhi’s prominent Jamia Milia Islamia University erupted in protest against the bill.

The so-called student protest then saw chanting of Islamic slogans like Allahu Akbar and Nara-e-Takbeer and Hinduphobic chants like Hinduon Se Azadi (Freedom from Hindus).

The protest soon turned violent and the protesters began pelting stones, which resulted in injuries to about a dozen police personnel and two of them had to be admitted in a hospital.

The situation worsened on Sunday (15 December) when a mob began rampaging on the streets of Delhi and burnt at least five buses and many private vehicles. Many city residents have recalled the horror as they had to flee for their lives.

While the Jamia mobs were rampaging, instead of universally condemning their violence, various prominent personalities and social media users began attacking the Delhi police for its brutality.

The detractors of the cops accused it of being high-handed in quelling the rampage and using excessive force against the reported Jamia students. This also resulted in a “solidarity protest” at UP’s Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) which too turned violent.

Various other education institutions in the country including premium ones like IIT Bombay took out protests condemning police action against the Jamia students.

Those supporting also included Bollywood celebrities and in one case Javed Akhtar also invented a law in a bid to paint the violent protesters as “victims”.

How Police Brutality Narrative Is Now Unravelling

One of the biggest blow to the “police brutality” narrative came yesterday (16 December) when a conspiracy theory about Delhi police setting buses on fire was busted.

Now videos have been made public by the Delhi police which shows senior officers politely requesting Jamia students to stop pelting stones and Molotov Cocktails.

In the video, Delhi police Joint Commissioner Devesh Shrivastav can be heard requesting the students not to come out on the roads, and pelt stones, bottles and tube lights.

Throughout the video, Shrivastav maintains a calm and polite tone by using phrases like “I request you beta”, while in the background one can hear the purported students hurling filthy abuses at cops and hurling stones from multiple directions.

In another video Shrivastav can be heard acknowledging the presence of anti-social elements among the students, while the cops were getting attacked. Around 10 of them have already been arrested by the cops.

This new video severely dents the narrative that the cops were thoroughly high-handed and brutal against the protesting “students”, and that the latter were innocent of any sort of wrongdoing. The cops instead can be seen being highly polite with the protesters in a bid to calmly quell matters.

The cops are expected to arrest more anti-social elements who were part of the so-called student protest.