Here comes the sun

FASTRising welcomes the new academic year with a series of activities: sit-ins, flour distribution, protest marches, design and writing competitions, seminars and film screenings.

At the joint meeting with the Young Professionals group held today, we decided on the plan for the first major all-out protest since the Long March: a two-hour dharna on campus, in solidarity with the dharna announced by the National Coordination Council of the Laywers Movement.

Event details:
When: 12 - 2 PM, 28 August, 2008
Where: Cafeteria entrance
What: Dharna + Campaign to collect 1,000 signatures in support of an independent judiciary

Rationale: Not all students are in a position to join the major demonstration at Charing Cross on the Mall. Just as important, it is one of our essential long-term objectives to sensitise young minds to the issues affecting the whole community and to provide a platform for independent thought, for sheer creativity, for novel explorations of the meaning of liberty.

We invite all members of the FAST-NU community to join us for a celebration of the re-discovery of truth* by the youth of the nation, for a re-affirmation of our resolve to keep fighting until our demands have been fulfilled.

* Post Scriptum on "truth": the truth that many of us have discovered is that our activism is a struggle for freedom.

In a larger sense, it's the truth that power and influence are there to be exercised by those who dare to speak out, to organise themselves, to conduct research and investigate the issues affecting society. The truth is embodied in all such actions and many of the younger generation have understood that the opposite attitudes, i.e., apathy and indifference, breed the lie that nothing can be changed.