While there have been consistent rise in the number of protests across U.S against the systemic racism, Indian students have been grappled with fear suggesting that when everyone is looking out for the cops, the last thing that you want as a student in a foreign country and a person of colour is to stay out of their way.
These Indian students in U.S have the dire urge to take part in all the anti-racism protests but being a person of colour and for someone as a vulnerable student outside of their home country, there is a constant strain on what is right and what is not. They also have the fear of being targeted over their colour of skin, the questions about hypocrispy of similar things happening in India. They are also worried that the same could end up threatening their visa status.
“If I get too close to the police, I make sure there is enough distance that I can outrun them, and I try to make sure I’m not in the place where the police are surrounding from all sides. It’s really scary,” said a PhD student from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Anti-racists protests broke out in the US in late-May following the death of 46-year old George Floyd by a white police officer. Floyd was murdered by former police officer Derek Chauvin who kneeled on his neck for nearly 9 minutes, cutting the oxygen supply.
Being a part of the solidarity
Being a human being with a sense of compassion, it is not even a question that standing in solidarity with the Black community at this point is the need of the hour. The same student from University of Wisconsin-Madison said that it is impossible for him to not go because the cause behind these protests is much larger issue across all the U.S states in the world.
“When you protest the prison-industrial complex and the police state in the United States, you’re also protesting an entire system –which not only works in the US but also in Latin America,” said the student who didn’t want to be named.
During the normal times of protests, the Indian students don’t necessarily worry about being involved. But, the heavy handed tactics of the police and rise in the police brutality was what charged people from across the world to come together.
Another student from the University of Minnesota reported that he had mostly restricted himself to the periphery of the police in Minneapolis. He said that he along with several the South-Asian students haven’t been able to be thick in the crowd because of the underlying fear. They had the constant fear that in case the police came around to arrest, they need to find ways to escape.
“Everyone is watching out for cops, but you’ve to make sure, as a student and as a person of colour, that you’re nowhere in their way,” the PhD student further added. Indian students have had to be very vigilant when you step out in such protests. The last thing you want is to get caught or in the middle of a charged argument.
But, when you see the police officers going out of their ways being violent against the crowd, it is common for people to have that common thought in their minds. The PhD student even reported that he himself lost his sense of consciousness when he saw a police truck ramming itself into a crowd of people.
“Seeing a tanker drive at full speed on to a bridge swarming with people is a different kind of sight. There’s something very inhuman about it,” he said.
Sudhanshu Kaushik, a 25-year-old who started the Young India Foundation in 2015 and the North American Association of Indian Students in 2020 further said that he understands the reason to be part of one of the biggest civilian movement. Kaushik said that he emphasised heavily with the black community now because as an Indian American, he has experienced similar racist experienced growing up.
Is there any questions of discomfort?
Being part of the protests full fledged comes with a lot of consequences for the Indian students studying in American. Being immigrants, and people of colour, people know that they are not truly American. There is a different level of comfort that comes being a White person and coming out on the streets to protest holding a placard with “Black Lives Matter” written on it.
When you are an Indian American, you’re more careful and constantly thinking about what is going to happen next.
“Once curfew hits, and if you’re out there, which many have been, I think then there is a different level of comfort that a US citizen can have compared to an international student,” said Kaushik.
Several of the organisers and the activists of the protests are brushing aside some of the consequences that come along with being arrested during such protests. These Indian students can even be deported if they get caught.
To further educate such students and bring more awareness to the subject, Kaushik has been actively posting on the NAAIS Instagram page to keep these students informed.
“We had been getting messages from students asking, ‘Hey, is it safe to go protest?’ Not necessarily because of it turning into a riot, but whether it was safe for them as international students on a visa to be out there,” Kaushik further highlighted.
How safe are these protests?
Students in U.S need to be extremely careful to not put themselves in the wrong situations because being arrested can result in getting deported.
During one such protest that was happening on State Street in Madison, the PhD student from the University of Wisconsin-Madison reported that he felt extremely vulnerable being in such a scene especially when he was not an American.
“There was tear gas, the police were in full gear walking down State Street and securing areas starting from the Wisconsin State Capitol because they didn’t want the crowd to come close to the building,” he said describing the deteriorating scene that he had not even experienced in his last five years of stay in U.S.
For an Indian American student on Visa, it is extremely risky going to these protests. Some students study in America on loans and very hard conditions and getting deported because of one wrong move can end up changing their whole lives for the worse.
“The violent response of the police has been of concern. We’ve seen tear gassing, smoke guns and that’s been more sanctioned because of curfew being imposed after 9.30 pm,” said Vipulya Chari, a PhD student at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
She said that it is risky for students on visas to be in such severe conditions but she said that she knows some white allies who have assured that they would put themselves in between them and the police to ensure that protestors of colour are protected.
Now is the time to stand in solidarity with the minorities and the oppressed people across the globe. While being compassionate with this situation is common for Indians to be attuned to, the same comes laced with hypocrisy, especially when Indian communities are obsessed with lightening their skin colour and judging people based on skin colour.
Not just that, similar cases of police brutality and constant oppression of the minorities have been a point of concern for the people in India but Indians fail to respond to the same with similar enthusiasm as they do with this.
