As the JNU violence news spread across the country, thousands of people from across the varsities joined in to protest against the outrage. Amidst the protesters in Mumbai, a host of Bollywood artistes, from actors, filmmakers, and lyricists, turned out at Carter Road on Monday night to show solidarity for those who were beaten up in the Jawaharlal Nehru University campus in South Delhi on Sunday night.
A mob of masked people had stormed the campus on 5 January and targetted students in three hostels, using weapons like sticks, stones, and iron rods and vandalizing university property.
The attack initiated protests across the country on Monday with demands of resignation of the vice-chancellor of the university.
Artistes contributed to the protest in their own way.
Swanand Kirkire sang a revolutionary song on love while filmmaker Vishal Bhardwaj recited Faiz Ahmed Faiz’s Hum Dekhenge, which was recently dubbed “anti-Hindu” and created much debate.
Filmmaker Vasan Bala tweeted, “Gateway of India ki aaj ki chai mere life ki best chai thi! Dumdaar! Inqualabi!”
Filmmaker Anurag Kashyap who was also at the protest said, “We are with the students of all the three universities (Aligarh, Jamia and JNU) who were attacked,” Sinha said. “We want to tell them, we are with them and we will stand for them every time.”
Talking about the violence, “We aren’t fools. We are watching. We know how riots are caused, how these situations are created. We can see what you want to do and what’s your intention and where you are taking us. We won’t let you take us there,” he was quoted a saying by Hindustan Times.
Hansal Mehta took to his Twitter account to write, “I love my city. In solidarity with the students of India.#OccupyGatewayOfIndia,” along with pictures of the protest from Mumbai’s Gateway of India.
Many others shared and wrote solidarity messages on their respective social media handles, including Taapsee Pannu, Sonam Kapoor, Swara Bhaskar, Alia Bhatt among others.
.@VishalBhardwaj at the silent protest of solidarity at Carter road, Mumbai against the #JNUattack pic.twitter.com/NtPKScfUdu
— Neeraj Ghaywan (@ghaywan) January 6, 2020
Gateway of India ki aaj ki chai mere life ki best chai thi!
Dumdaar!
Inqualabi!— Vasan 🅱🅰L🅰 (@Vasan_Bala) January 6, 2020