Initially it seemed like there were more
media folk than actual protestors sporting the Guy Fawkes mask – which
has come to symbolize Anonymous.
Slowly the number of protestors started to increase. It was, however, a
very small number of protestors – a little over a 75 approximately.
Majority of the protestors were college-going youth who were
distributing pamphlets and answering a lot of questions. As there is no
single representative body or chapter of Anonymous, what we had was a
bunch of passionate protestors.
“Till a few years back, we thought that
torrents could not be blocked. But the government blocked it. Tomorrow
what if they block proxy servers as well? We don’t think the government
is that powerful, at least when it comes to technicalities. But by
blocking sites, they are proving that they are just plain dumb. The
government cannot stifle freedom of speech. We are not a dictatorship,
we are a democracy where freedom of expression is a fundamental right,”
was the unanimous statement given by the protestors.
On being asked about the poor
participation numbers for the protest, a group replied, “This is just
the first protest. Expect us. See it takes time to build a momentum.
Anna Hazare got so much support, but he has been chasing the issue of
corruption for years. We will surely get more numbers in our next
protest. But all we want to tell the government is – Expect Us! ” The
low turnout sure wasn’t dampening the spirits of those who had
assembled.
Mass movements need a constant
engagement, so we asked the protestors what were their future plans. We
got mixed responses from various protestors, but the underlying theme of
all the responses was that this was just a beginning. “We are expecting
tremendous help from the media. The whole idea of this protest is to
make people aware of why we are doing this. Not a lot of people have
even heard of Anonymous. We want to create awareness. With the help of
Anonymous’ facebook page we plan to organize more such awareness camps
or protests, till we get an assurance from the government that it will
not go about arbitrarily censoring the Internet,” responded one group.
On the topic of torrents, we got some
interesting responses. “OK I may have downloaded a game via torrents,
but if I really like I game, I just go ahead and purchase it. Moreover,
if I have a music collection, which I want to share with my friend over
torrents – that is the same as me giving my CD to him. I own the CD,
likewise I own the music. The government can’t stop me from sharing it
with my friend. That is just wrong.”
While another protestor highlighted
the other side of torrents, “It is not true that torrents only help in
pirating movies and music. There are tonnes of legitimate torrents as
well. By putting a blanket ban on torrent sites such as Pirate Bay and
Torrentz, the government is blocking legitimate torrents as well. That
is just not fair!”
Earlier in the day cert.in-org, a
government backed website was brought down; some days back MTNL website
was defaced. On being asked if they felt that defacing government
websites was the right way to go about things? “Anonymous is defacing
websites, as that is the only way to get attention. Once the word
spreads, more people will know about Anonymous. It will get people
curious about it and ultimately help in awareness,” they agreed.
Most of the protestors were dressed in
black. Some, even wearing coats in the sweltering Mumbai heat. Guy
Fawkes masks were seen all around. In fact, we learned that the plastic
Guy Fawkes masks were being sold at Crawford market for Rs. 180 a pop.
And here’s the kicker – the guy selling these masks had absolutely no
clue about why there was such a demand for these masks.
We felt that had the protest been
organized at the Gateway of India or had there been a street march,
there might have been a much bigger crowd around the Anonymous
protestors. The absence of an organizing committee was quite apparent.
But it was heartening to see a decent amount of media folk, ensuring
coverage. Absence of working professionals vis-à-vis students was a
cause for worry, but maybe next time such a protest will see more
holistic participation.
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