After the country’s top wrestlers had FIRs slapped against them following the confrontation with Delhi Police, Rio 2016 bronze medallist Sakshi Malik, Tokyo 2020 medallist Bajrang Punia and world championship medallist Vinesh Phogat have said they will throw their medals in the Ganga at Haridwar on Tuesday as a way of protesting the high-handedness of the police.
The wrestlers also said they will sit on a fast unto death at New Delhi’s India Gate. “These medals are our life and soul. After we put it in River Ganga, there would be no meaning for us to live for. so we will got to India Gate and sit on a fast until death,” the wrestlers said in a statement, reported The Indian Express.
The wrestlers, who had been protesting at the Jantar Mantar, were marching to the new Parliament building on Sunday to hold a women’s ‘Mahapanchayat’ outside the Parliament as it was being inaugurated. But they were detained by the Delhi Police on the way.
Later the police registered FIRs against them and cleared out their protest site at Jantar Mantar. When the wrestlers were being detained, they resisted, leading to dramatic images where wrestlers were being grabbed and lifted by multiple policewomen and put into buses.
“All of you saw whatever happened on May 28. The way we were treated and detained by the police. The police not only cleared out our protest area at Jantar Mantar, but also registered FIRs against us, despite the fact that we were protesting peacefully. Have female athletes committed some crime by asking for justice for the sexual harassment committed against them? We have been treated like criminals,” a statement posted on social media by all three wrestlers read.
