Mainstream WeeklyImages of protestors from the satirical political movement Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) at Jantar Mantar, giving flowers to police officers, are circulating on social media, which many have interpreted as a representation of democratic civility and political maturity. Such gestures convey the idea that dissent should not be confrontational and that it can coexist peacefully with state institutions. Moreover, the offering of flowers is not just a kind act with no political meaning; rather, it is a political gesture, and political gestures acquire meaning not just in what they display but also in what they conceal. Such a spectacle in Jantar Mantar allows us to reflect on the concept of public memory and the uneven ways in which certain police actions are remembered or even forgotten, particularly when contrasted with police actions against students of Jamia Milia Islamia during the anti-CAA/NRC protests.
The act of offering flowers to police personnel is not, in itself, problematic. In democratic societies, such gestures often take a practical form and demonstrate the mutual respect and goodwill that state institutions and protestors share. The difficulty arises when such gestures are detached from the historical memory. Many Indians, particularly those who participated in the 2019 anti-CAA/NRC protests, have a very troubling image of police, which often invokes a sense of fear and vulnerability. Images of police entering the campus, reports of beating the students, and damaging the university facilities, specifically the reading room, are all vivid memories for the students.
The horrific accounts of the students and protestors who were attacked by the police became a defining feature of the state institution’s interaction with dissent. Although people have had different political inclinations, the event at Jamia left an enduring mark on the public consciousness.
This troubling history surrounding JMI, which many people have of police, is etched in the public consciousness, and the police action against the protesting students became a defining symbol of state power confronting dissent.
The memory of Jamia is not an isolated event. Such concerns also emerged in relation to the anti-CAA/NRC protests at Aligarh Muslim University. Incidents like these occupied a particularly powerful place in the public imagination. It became a symbol through which broader concerns and anxieties about citizenship, state power, and dissent were articulated. The images of damaged facilities and injured students were widely shared on social media primarily because they revealed the troubling relationship between the state and those who oppose it.
The comparison and contrast are politically imperative. The same institution that is celebrated today through symbolic gestures was, some years ago, a center of huge public criticism for its treatment of protesting students of Jamia Milia Islamia. It is not an issue whether the police deserve flowers or not, and thus deserve respect. The issue is why certain histories of police action are easily erased from public memory, while others are elevated and celebrated. The public memory is thus a political field, and not merely a record of events, in which certain narratives and experiences are remembered, and others are forgotten.
The images from Jantar Mantar are thus politically revealing. They demonstrate how easily painful histories shift and are overshadowed by the emergence of new spectacles and how swiftly popular narratives change. The question is not whether showing respect to police officers should be discouraged, but rather whether a sincere examination of unresolved histories in public memory accompanies such gestures.
The true significance of the offering of flowers at Jantar Mantar lies not in the gesture itself but rather the concerns it raises with it. Why do societies choose to remember, and why do they choose to forget? Why do certain histories remain central to the public consciousness while others fade from the public memory? A society that forgets easily risks repeating the injustice it once sought to overcome. An important challenge before us is that our reconciliation should not come at the expense of forgetting our historical remembrance.
(Author: Abrar Nazir is currently a PhD in political science at Thapar School of Liberal Arts and Sciences, TIET.)