Journalists and activists in the city organised two protests to condemn the murder of Karnataka journalist Gauri Lankesh. In two meetings organised at the Press Club and the Journalists Union office in the city, the scribes accused Karnataka and Union governments of having caused the death of Gauri, a senior journalist who was gunned down on Tuesday.
Wednesday protests also had solidarity of activists and writers of Hyderabad including Vara Vara Rao of Virasam Revolutionary Writers Collective. Speaking to The Hindu, Mr. Rao said, “Gauri Lankesh was instrumental in bringing out many cases of State violence including those committed by right-wing forces like Bajrang Dal. She and I together wrote against the expressway project between Telangana and Karnataka that displaced people. Her death was orchestrated by those she exposed. She was a conscientious journalist.”
Telangana balladeer who was once associated with Communist Party of India-Maoist, Gaddar, remembered Gauri as a writer who represented the voice of politically persecuted people. “During my days of armed struggle underground she wrote many articles to prevent police action against me. I managed to stay alive. They killed her,” an emotionally wrought Gaddar said. Members of Network of Women in Media shared their organisation’s concerns at the protest venue. NWMI asked Press Club of India, Editors’ Guild to take into account “Twitter and online lynch mob that has surrounded the murder of Gauri Lankesh”. The organisation asked PCI to help disband “Twitter handles...which have been baying for Gauri’s blood”.
A journalist who reported from Chhattisgarh Malini Subramaniam asked journalists of the country to unitedly fight the tendency to suppress media voice. Journalist Vanaja asked women journalists to follow Gauri’s lead to keep up their fight in the society and media houses. Hyderabad journalists held marches to Raj Bhavan Road and Basheerbagh junction in protest. Individual journalists, especially women, were seen holding placards that read, “I am also Gauri.” Protests demanded a probe into the murder and asked governments concerned to punish the culprits. Most called Gauri’s death a political assassination.
The third in a series of protests in Hyderabad against the killing of journalist-activist Gauri Lankesh saw hundreds of citizens and journalists turn up for a noisy protest in central Basheerbagh area of the city on Wednesday. At 4 p.m., working journalists union organised another protest meeting at Sundarayya Vignana Kendram. “ Nahi chalegi nahi chalegi gundagardi nahi chalegi ” and a host of other slogans denouncing the killing of Gauri Lankesh rent the air. Many of the protesters held up placards in Telugu, Hindi, English and Urdu with slogans to denounce the killing.
“We have reached the end of the road. The killings appear random, but there is a systemic planning that’s happing while the resistance is fragmented. I am devastated. We can keep shouting slogans but what is the road ahead? I am disturbed by that awareness,” said Kalpana Kannabiran, lawyer and rights activist, who had reached the spot to raise her voice against the killing.
