Organisers expect over a hundred cyclists to join their Fourth Bicycle Rally for Peace between India and Pakistan this year
A youth group in India is starting the new year with their fourth bicycle ride for peace between India and Pakistan from Delhi, kicking off on January 1, 2017 from India Gate, New Delhi, and ending at the Attari-Wagah border on January 9, 2017.
The now almost annual event started in 2013, organised by the Delhi University Students For Peace (DUSFP) group. Two years later, they changed their name to People for Peace in order to make the movement more broad-based. This year, they have taken on the name ‘Milne Do’ (Let’s Meet), inspired, says group convenor Praveen Kumar Singh, by Milne Do, the campaign against visa restrictions between India and Pakistan initiated by Aman ki Asha.
An unprecedented peace initiative launched on January 1, 2010 by the two largest media groups of both countries respectively, The Times of India and the Jang Group of Pakistan, Aman ki Asha aims to create a platform for people-to-people dialogue and interaction between India and Pakistan across all divides regardless of media or political affiliations.
“We are the representatives of the new generation of India hailing from mostly lower middle class social strata undergoing university educational courses with progressive outlook who are optimistic and always forward looking,” says the Milne Do website.
The peace cyclists’ aim has consistently been the same, regardless of the name they used: to promote good neighbourly, friendly relations between India and Pakistan. Besides the cycle peace rallies the youth also participate in street theatre activism and conduct flash mobs to spread the peace message among the public, for example at the Times of India’s Rahgiri festival at Connaught Place in New Delhi.
The ‘Milne Do’ cycle peace rally organisers expect around a hundred cyclists to join them, including students from Delhi University, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Jamia-Millia-Islamia, and other universities and colleges from northeastern and southern India, besides advocates from the High Court of Delhi and the Supreme court of India along with other eminent citizens.
They will be flagged off by a host of eminent personalities, including respected senior journalist Kuldip Nayar, who has been present at previous starting ceremonies of the group. Others include former Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court Rajindar Sachar, Chairman of Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts and former news editor of Jansatta newspaper Rambahadur Rai, Professor Anand Kumar, who taught sociology at Jawaharlal Nehru University, Coordinator Burma Centre Delhi Dr. Alana Golmei, theatre activist Arvind Gaur of Smita Theatre known for his innovative, socially and politically relevant work, CEO of S3C Ebudhou Marking Film Productions and social worker Sangita Takhelmayum from Manipur, Faisal Khan of Khudai Khidmatgar, and political cartoonist and activist Aseem Trivedi.
The peace activists will cycle through rural areas and cities in Sonipat, Panipat, Karnal, Kurukshetra, Ambala, Sirhind, Ludhiana, Jalandhar and Amritsar to reach Wagah border. This is the route they have followed for their last two rallies, held January 1 to 8, 2016 that also started from India Gate. The earlier rally on August 1- August 14, 2014 started from Delhi University.
The first cycle rally for peace, held in 2013, was the most ambitious, with the cyclists riding from Kanyakumari in India’s southern-most tip to Wagah border starting on June 1 with the slogan “We Love Our Neighbour Pakistan”. Flagged off by former chief minister of Kerala V.S. Achutanandan they cycled some 3,800 km in the summer heat, reaching the border on August 15. They received overwhelming support along the way and gathered thousands of signatures endorsing their peace campaign.
The cyclists’ dream is to cross the border and join with Pakistani cyclists to go up to Lahore and Islamabad but visa restrictions between the two countries have prevented this from becoming a reality so far.
Cyclists from Pakistan including from the Lahore Critical Mass cyclists’ group plan to ride to the border and meet their Indian counterparts at Wagah border on January 8, 2017.
Milne Do welcomes responses from the public. They can be reached by phone at +91-97171 22748, +91-88 26 424715, and +91-95821 10080, or email at [email protected].