Protests at a point where spontaneity has to be coordinated: Yogendra Yadav

Protests against Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar and the Election Commission’s (EC) Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise are increasingly bringing together Opposition parties, youth-led groups and citizens unaffiliated with political organisations. The challenge now is to turn these parallel agitations into coordinated action without imposing a centralised command structure.

In an interview with Sanket Upadhyay on The Federal’s special programme AI With Sanket, political analyst Yogendra Yadav discussed Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi’s call for unity, the evolving relationship between the Congress and the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), the role of farmers’ organisations and why the participation of ordinary citizens could prove decisive for the movement.

Edited excerpts from the interview:

Why is it important to treat all protests as one?

Two things have happened over the weekend. First, what you called segregation is actually giving way to a coming together. There was a perceived segregation, but there is now a firm move towards bringing the protests together.

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Second, the regime put all its power into ensuring that Jantar Mantar 2.0 did not happen at Jantar Mantar. But what we witnessed over the weekend and then on Monday was that the protesters reached that fortress, and finally, on Monday, the streets were reclaimed. That, to my mind, is the big picture.

On the question of unity, let me begin with physics. There is an interesting concept called spontaneous synchronisation. If you put two clocks with pendulums moving at slightly different paces, after some time you would find that they are moving exactly together. You find the same thing when birds take off. Their wings flutter differently, but when they are in formation, after some point, they start fluttering in exactly the same way.

What we have witnessed in the protests so far is a case of spontaneous synchronisation.

A group of seven or eight citizen agencies, including Neha Bora, gave a call for protests on October 2, 3, 4 and 5. This was not an organisational call. It was a call by a set of concerned citizens.

The protests continued over those days. On October 6, the Opposition took over. There was no understanding or series of phone calls saying, "We'll do it on these days, and you do it on the sixth." But it so happened that the Opposition picked up the agitation on October 6, 7, 8, and 9.

On October 10, the CJP called for a protest, which spilled over into October 11. On October 12, the INDIA bloc called for action.

This is precisely what spontaneous synchronisation is all about.

But we have now reached a point where this spontaneity needs to be slightly coordinated. That need not mean that everything should happen under one flag, one banner or one centralised command. There is, however, a need for deliberate synchronisation and coordination.

Moves have been made, and Rahul Gandhi's own move is politically a very mature one. This is what leadership is all about.

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Many people associated with the Congress ecosystem said nasty things about the CJP. In turn, CJP leaders responded in ways that could come in the way of coordinated action.

But the stand taken by Rahul Gandhi, his participation in the protest, his remarks at the press conference and his tweet responding to the arrest of Ashutosh Ranka and Saurav Das underline that his call that all protests are one is not merely an abstract call. It is not just a rhetorical statement. He is willing to speak against the arrest of a movement that is supposed to be distant from him.

So, there is a convergence taking place. To my mind, that convergence holds the key to the future of this protest.

Stage one has been achieved. Protests have happened. Police brutality has been opposed. The fortress has been reached, and the streets have been reclaimed. But what next?

The next stage has to involve more deliberate coordination across the country, spreading the scope, deepening the reach and amplifying the voice. My sense is that we are now moving towards that.

If coordination is needed, who leads? Doesn’t coordinated action require someone at the top?

Yes, we need coordination, but not quite of the kind you are imagining. We should not expect that kind of centralised command in a movement of this kind.

Even in the farmers' movement, although there was an apex committee and I was part of its nine-member team, if we claimed that we had the authority to get everything done, that would not be true.

Movements of this kind are always somewhat loosely coordinated. But you are right that we need better coordination than we have at present.

There are at least six strands in this movement.

The first is the Congress. The second is the INDIA bloc parties other than the Congress. The third comprises Opposition parties outside the INDIA bloc, including the AAP, the BRS and other political formations that have taken positions against the SIR and the Election Commission. The fourth strand is within the youth protests, represented by the CJP. The fifth comprises youth organisations, some left-wing and some non-left-wing. The sixth is ordinary citizens who are not affiliated with any political party or organisation.

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These six strands can never be brought into complete harmony. But can we ensure that they do not work at cross purposes? That is the important thing.

To my mind, the question is not who the leader is. That is quite self-evident.

The real question, and the source of anxiety and sometimes scepticism, is how much that leader should take everyone along and in what ways.

No one is trying to compete with Rahul Gandhi to be the Leader of the Opposition. At least, I did not see that at all.

Even during their informal interactions, including the famous cup of tea yesterday, there was no question about who the leader was.

The real challenge is how that leader should accommodate all these diverse trends, strands, pulls and pressures. What I have witnessed over the last week is substantial progress in that direction.

If you recall, for the first two years after the 2024 elections, the INDIA bloc did not even meet. But two months after its last meeting, we had a second meeting, and there was a degree of commonality of purpose.

Something is evolving. What I saw in that bus and over that cup of tea yesterday represents substantial progress in that direction.

Sometimes unity produces movements, and sometimes moments produce unity. This is one of those occasions.

Does a loosely knit movement make it easier for others to join?

I think it should be open.

As I mentioned, the BRS from Telangana, for example, is not part of the ruling coalition. It has been known to be on somewhat good terms with the NDA and has not gone out of its way to oppose the NDA at the Centre.

You would have noticed that the BRS has now taken a position against the SIR and the Chief Election Commissioner.

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These are decisive moments that can produce greater unity. The doors must remain open for other significant players to join.

One such player would be the farmers' movement.

The Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM) could not participate in Monday's protest because it was holding its general body meeting in Karnal, Haryana. But sooner rather than later, you would see the SKM and the farmers' leadership play a very significant role.

Please remember that the SKM, as the largest platform of farmers' organisations, has already passed a formal resolution opposing the Chief Election Commissioner, opposing the SIR and demanding the restoration of electoral fairness.

But to my mind, the biggest player is ordinary people, mostly young people, who are not affiliated with any organisation or political party.

What made Monday's protest in Delhi so significant was not merely that the Congress had carried out some very impressive mobilisation. The Samajwadi Party had also carried out some decent mobilisation.

But what made the difference was what I saw from the bus and then on the ground.

At least a quarter of the people present at that large public gathering in the heart of Delhi were not mobilised by political organisations. Young people were coming in small groups, women were coming in small groups, and citizens were coming out on their own.

There was a substantial contribution from people who were not cadres of any political party or organisation. Even if they accounted for 15 per cent of the mobilisation, that should worry the Modi government.

Normally, when large political parties hold rallies, almost all the people present are mobilised through the party machinery.

That was not the case on Monday.

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What makes the CJP protests and the protests by youth organisations so significant is that, in their case, much of the mobilisation is organic.

It is this organic mobilisation that must remain at the heart of the entire strategy and future planning. This movement will succeed only if, and to the extent that, it can keep these ordinary citizens who have mobilised organically with it.

Will this coming together actually force the government to act, or can it dismiss them as professional andolan jeevis?

I mentioned six elements. The third comprises political parties that have not traditionally opposed the BJP. The BRS is a very good example.

Their movement may be small, but it is very significant. It gives you a sense of the political drift. These are straws in the wind.

The most important element, however, is the sixth: ordinary people. That is why I said their participation is critical.

In political movements around the world, organised groups are always involved in driving events. But movements succeed only when they connect with the unorganised, the unmobilised and those who participate organically.

That is happening, and it should worry the BJP.

Why would you cancel trade? If this had been a big Congress rally, as the authorities initially thought Monday's protest would be, they might simply have sat back and said, "Let them do it."

What was the anxiety? The anxiety was that, as on July 20, tens of thousands of ordinary, unmobilised citizens might descend on the streets of Delhi.

That is the fear of the regime. And the regime knows it better than you and I do because it has access to better-quality surveys than we do. It knows that something is shifting in a big way in this country.

You have seen protests, and I have seen protests during the Congress regime.

At that time, the CPI(ML) and the Indian People's Front held a rally in Delhi that drew nearly one million people. One million agricultural workers came to Delhi. Trains were running to bring them to the capital.

The authorities knew that trainloads of protesters were coming from Bihar, yet the trains were not stopped.

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Why would you stop trains or impose this kind of restriction? You would do so because the regime is paranoid.

Why this kind of repression? Because all dictatorial regimes, when they face a legitimacy crisis, resort to repression.

And I absolutely believe that Opposition parties coming together is not enough. Ultimately, everything depends on the extent to which ordinary people become agitated and mobilised, if not on the streets, then at least on their screens, where they can speak out.

That is what is happening. To my mind, that is the real strength of this particular protest movement.

That is why I think a negative spiral has begun for this regime because of the presence of these ordinary citizens.