Image via the Democratic Youth Federation of India
By Global News Service
On January 20, more than two million people joined the massive human chain organized by the Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) in protest of the far-right Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led central government’s apathy and discrimination toward the State of Kerala. The southern state is governed by the Left Democratic Front coalition led by the Communist Party of India (Marxist).
By 5 p.m., people from all walks of life, including youths, students, women, workers, cultural activists, and leftist politicians, joined the 651 km-long unbroken human chain. The millions who joined the human chain took an oath to take the struggle forward and also participated in political and cultural gatherings organized in more than 200 locations along the human chain that spanned the length of Kerala.
A. Rahim, member of Parliament and DYFI all-India President, joined the chain in its first link in Kasaragod in northern Kerala, while LDF convener and former State minister, E. P. Jayarajan, was part of the last unit in front of Raj Bhavan (the seat of the central-appointed state governor), in the state capital Thiruvananthapuram.
DYFI, a progressive youth organization, has been at the forefront of Indian youth struggles against the austerity-ridden, neo-liberal policies and sectarianism of the Hindu-right wing BJP. The national government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been accused of trying to stifle and derail the functioning of opposition-ruled States through a series of administrative hurdles, challenging the fundamental federal character of the Indian state envisaged by the constitution.
from the Peoples Dispatch / Globetrotter News Service