The Bombay High Court’s recent remark during the hearing of the CPI(M)’s petition, suggesting that citizens must “show patriotism for their own country first” before protesting the genocide in Palestine, is deeply disappointing and unbecoming of a judiciary charged with protecting democratic rights. The HC further remarked to discuss only local civic problems like garbage dumping, sewage crisis etc.
Patriotism in India was forged during a freedom struggle that stood not only against colonialism and injustice at home but also in solidarity with oppressed peoples around the world. Patriotism is not blind isolationism, politics is not confined to just municipal concerns.
Today, standing against the ongoing genocide in Gaza, where Palestinian civilians, including children, women, and the elderly, are being bombed, starved, and displaced, is a moral, humanitarian, and political imperative. India has historically stood in solidarity with the Palestinian struggle against Israel’s illegal occupation and for the right to a sovereign homeland. It is the people’s democratic right to protest any attempt by those in power to betray our country’s anti-colonial legacy.
Across the country, the right to protest has been under attack through crackdowns on dissent, violence against protesters, and shrinking public spaces. It is deeply troubling that when people turn to the courts to defend their rights, they are met not with protection, but with dismissive and disempowering remarks.
If the judiciary is concerned about the issue of "garbage dumping," it should understand that dumping the garbage of zionist settler colonialism, racist apartheid and genocidal occupation being practised by Israel is a global civilizational imperative and the Indian people are never going to be complicit in the US-Israel genocidal violence.
— issued by Dipankar Bhattacharya, GS, CPI(ML) Liberation on July 26
