We are with you, Irom Sharmila.

Recognise Sharmila's Fasting; Don't ill treat her!!

Hunger striking as a tactic is part of an ancient Indian tradition. The right to protest peacefully is one of the remarkable aspects of living in a democracy. In recent times, in spite of the alarming tendencies at stifling and censuring protest, the culture of protest continues to be vibrant in India. Irom Sharmila has been on hunger strike for over 12 years against the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) which has been an instrument of human rights violation. The purpose of Sharmila’s struggle has been to seek the withdrawal of the AFSPA. Sharmila’s hunger strike is a method of non-violent resistance or an act of political protest  to provoke feelings of guilt in the state machinery, with an objective of achieving a specific goal of the repeal of the draconian AFSPA.  She didn’t subvert democracy with her hunger strike but indeed she is trying to strengthen it.

Hunger strikes are no doubt a legitimate form of protest in matters of public importance. It is a pressure tactic in an attempt to make the government more accountable. India has a lot more supporting evidences to show that many people have done this in the past like Bhagat Singh’s fast to treat all prisoners equally, VP Singh’s hunger strike against the Bombay Riots in 1993, Medha Patkar’s hunger strike in protest of the Narmada Dam in 2006, etc.  It is also true that fasts can be sometimes coercive like Gandhi’s fasting against separate electorates for the untouchables. Even though the way Anna Hazare used fasting methods undemocratically, the state and the media endorsed the drive as passive resistance and yielded to the demands of the campaign. Unfortunately, Sharmila’s indefinite fast for over a decade continues to be ignored by the civil society, the political leadership and the mainstream media.

When Anna Hazare’s hunger strike garnered considerable government attention, why civil rights activist Irom Sharmila’s hunger strike was rebuffed with the slapping of IPC 309? How terribly has the state dealt with Irom Sharmila’s protests? She has frequently been arrested, charged with an attempt to commit suicide, for her sustained fasting. Sharmila is under arrest for over a decade, and is being force-fed, a practice which the World Medical Association deems as a form of inhuman torture and degrading treatment. It has been through her concerted efforts that criticism of AFSPA has become an integral part of civil society discourse. It was totally unconstitutional for the Indian government to place Irom Sharmila under arrest, and it was further immoral of them to accuse her of black-mailing the government. A hunger strike is a perfectly legitimate pressure tactic that has been employed throughout history by many citizens and political leaders, to demand their rights in a democracy. It is a constitutionally valid, non-violent form of protest, which works only when the demand of the person fasting represents popular opinion. Fasting should be allowed as part of any functioning democracy, which allows citizens the right to protest and express their views in any non-violent manner. Hunger-strikes or fasts have long been an essential part of the Indian form of resistance. In a democracy, hunger-strike cannot be tantamount to extra-constitutional blackmail.

For your further reading, The Hindu Report dated 30-03-2013

Starving to live, not die

When the Supreme Court has recognised the right to go on hunger strike, why is Irom Sharmila’s protest against impunity of the armed forces a criminal act?

Over the past 12 years, Irom Sharmila Chanu has carried on an inconceivable hunger strike, which has seen her body wither and her skin turn pale. During this period, she has emerged as the face of the civilian resistance to the immunity, and impunity, granted by the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act to the army in Manipur. The Indian state has done its part to disfigure that face, by exhibiting either an inability or unwillingness to meet Sharmila’s demands. Today, it is impossible to think of Sharmila without recalling images of the feeding tube that has been forcibly thrust down her nose to keep her alive. However, the repeal of AFSPA and justice for the 10 civilians who were shot dead in November 2002 by the Assam Rifles in supposed retaliation to an attack by insurgents in Malom, Manipur — which triggered Sharmila’s protest — still remain elusive. Instead, Sharmila’s dissent expressed via her fast unto death has repeatedly been viewed as criminal.

Sharmila has put the Indian state in a peculiar position, by reconfiguring the dynamics of power through a public sacrifice of her body. Should the state, as it has done so far, view her indefinite fast through the lens of criminality and consider it “an attempt to commit suicide,” when Sharmila has unequivocally asserted her love of living? Or is it incongruous to do so, especially when the Supreme Court, in its recent and much-hailed intervention in the Ram Lila Maidan protests against corruption, has recognised that “hunger strike is a form of protest which has been accepted, both historically and legally in our constitutional jurisprudence”? In fact, Sharmila’s hunger strike is an area of stark legal vacuum. When there is a conflict between her freedom of expression and the Indian state’s interest, and perhaps duty, in keeping her alive, can a balance between these conflicting ends be struck without criminalising Sharmila’s actions?

 The history

Examples of hunger strikes used as an expression of dissent are copious; the suffragettes used them in their campaign seeking the vote for women in England during the early 20th century. Hunger strikes around the world have typically, though not exclusively, been waged by prisoners. Such was the case when some imprisoned Irish Republicans famously went on a hunger strike in 1981 to protest British rule of Ireland, leading to the death of Bobby Sands and nine others. Prisoners tend to use hunger strikes as a mode of protest, either to advocate a cause disagreeable to the state or to express their dissent against what they believe to be a wrongful conviction. In the former category fall cases like that of Marion Wallace Dunlop, a pioneering suffragette who was sent to prison for printing an extract from the Bill of Rights on the wall of St. Stephen’s Hall in the House of Commons. In prison, Dunlop commenced a hunger strike to continue her protest seeking the right of women to vote. In the latter category fall prisoners like William Coleman, who has been on a hunger strike lasting almost five years in a jail in Connecticut, U.S., to protest what he believes to be his wrongful conviction. Since the global trend has been for persons already imprisoned to resort to a hunger strike, this mode of protest has usually been viewed abroad as a prisoners’ rights issue. The state’s response of force-feeding prisoners has been considered by some as being tantamount to torture and an unacceptable intrusion in the autonomy of the prisoner, akin to rape.

However, India’s own experience with hunger strikes, which has been very well documented, has shown that viewing the issue through a prisoners’ rights framework is ill-advised. Our freedom fighters, Mahatma Gandhi in particular, developed and perfected this non-violent form of protest as a facet of satyagraha, and although several hunger strikes were carried out by freedom fighters during periods of incarceration, the resort to this mode of protest has never been an exclusive domain of the imprisoned. For instance, Potti Sreeramulu, a freedom fighter and Gandhian, fasted to his death, in seeking the creation of a separate State of Andhra Pradesh in independent India. The Narmada Bachao Andolan movement witnessed hunger strikes in 2002 to protest the construction of dams over the Maan River in Dhar, Madhya Pradesh.

More recently, Anna Hazare and his associates carried on hunger strikes against corruption. All of these protests were, and continue to be, carried on for the large part, outside the walls of prison. For this reason, a prisoners’ rights framework may, by itself, be insufficient to view the legality of hunger strikes in India.

Attempted suicide?

An alternative way to analyse hunger strikes, especially fasts unto death, is through the framework of a constitutional right to die. In India, not a little morbidly, this argument seems to have reached a “dead end.” Although the Supreme Court in P. Rathinam v. Union of India (1994) initially asserted that the Indian constitutional guarantee of a fundamental right to life carries with it a fundamental right to die, subsequent decisions in Gian Kaur v. State of Punjab (1996) and Aruna Shanbaug v. Union of India (2011) overruled that view, and it is now conclusively established that Indian citizens do not have a fundamental right to die. In Gian Kaur, the Supreme Court upheld the validity of Section 309 of the Indian Penal Code, which criminalises the “attempt to commit suicide” (i.e. the provision under which Sharmila has been charged, and previously convicted). In Shanbaug, the Supreme Court allowed only for a highly circumscribed right to approach courts to seek withdrawal of life support systems for patients in a permanent vegetative state. Thus, it appears futile to argue that Indian citizens have a right to fast unto death when, according to the apex court, they have no right to die. However, this does not automatically mean that the undertaking of fasts unto death is criminal or that one does not have a fundamental right to hunger strike of a definite period where there is no danger of death being caused. One may not have the right to do something, but to do it nonetheless needn’t be criminal.

In independent India, the resort to hunger strikes has usually, though with some exceptions (such as the hunger strike by prisoners within a jail), not been viewed through the lens of criminality. For instance, Potti Sreeramulu was never considered criminal or suicidal by the Indian state for his fatal hunger strike. Anna Hazare likewise has undertaken several indefinite hunger strikes for various causes, but has never been perceived as a criminal on this account. The most prominent example of the Indian state criminalising a fast unto death per se is that of Sharmila’s. If we really believe rape is as vile as we have recently claimed it to be, then would it be just to treat Sharmila’s strike against AFSPA, a law that shields rapists from prosecution, differently from Hazare’s strike against corruption? More importantly, would it be just for a society’s laws to selectively criminalise hunger strikes depending upon the objectives such strikes seek to achieve?

 This brings us to the question of whether Sharmila’s case, and more generally fasts unto death, are appropriately viewed as “attempts to commit suicide” under Section 309 of the Indian Penal Code. Any criminal offence, barring certain exceptions, requires the proof of a mens rea, or the existence of a guilty mind. Sharmila has been fasting not with an intention to die, but with an intention to achieve a desired result from the state. Her refusal to consume food or water can be criminalised only if she has acted in furtherance of a conscious endeavour to commit suicide. In the absence of such conscious endeavour, to accuse and prosecute her for an offence under Section 309 is misconceived.

Freedom to express

The questions of whether to treat Sharmila as criminal and whether the state should be allowed to force-feed her are distinct. As misguided as Sharmila’s prosecution may be, the question regarding the legality of nasally force-feeding her to keep her alive still remains open. The Supreme Court has, on the one hand, held that the threat of going on a hunger strike extended by Baba Ramdev at Ram Lila Maidan, cannot be termed illegal. Presumably, this right that the court spoke of flows from a citizen’s right to freedom of expression. That right is subject to “reasonable restrictions” in the interest of the sovereignty and integrity of India, public order, decency, morality, or in relation to contempt of court, defamation or incitement to an offence. If Sharmila’s fast unto death is essentially an exercise of her fundamental right to freedom of expression, the state, in force-feeding her, may presumably be acting in furtherance of its right to impose reasonable restrictions as permitted by our Constitution. However, force-feeding, even if conducted in a humane and largely non-intrusive manner, has been widely considered to be tantamount to torture. Even though the state might merely be imposing restrictions that are reasonable within the meaning of Article 19 of the Constitution, the measure might nonetheless be a violation of Sharmila’s right to life and personal liberty under Article 21.

In our opinion, fasts unto death occupy an area of legal vacuum that offer no easy solutions. Should the state allow Sharmila to die and, in the process, abdicate its duty to protect life? Or must it resort to force-feeding her, even though such actions hit at the core of her bodily integrity? While neither offers a perfectly tailored legal solution, what is certain is that a balance ought to be struck between these starkly conflicting ends without criminalising Sharmila’s actions. For, to do so would be tantamount to stigmatising an exercise by a citizen of her right to freedom of expression in advocating a particular cause when other citizens have used the freedom in exactly the same manner without suffering prosecution, simply because they advocated causes of a different, and less complex, nature.

Sterlite Copper closure: A Welcome Step

My Letter to The Hindu dated 01-03-2013

The plant closure is a major victory for MDMK-backed activists who campaigned for it for two decades. The resistance group comprising fishermen, farmers and students was small but it took on the copper smelting giant even as the company denied causing pollution. It is true that development involves industrialisation. But it is absurd to argue that it can be achieved only by destroying the environment. The struggle at Tuticorin represents the efforts of the locals to wage a relentless battle against a company at both the judicial and grass-roots levels.

For your reading, the Hindu Report dated 31-03-2013:

TN government orders closure of Sterlite copper smelter

Mired in controversy in recent days, Sterlite Industries Limited’s copper smelter in Tuticorin was shut down on Saturday.

Operations in the plant came to a standstill in the wake of an order from the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board. Tuticorin Collector Ashish Kumar instructed officials to inspect the Vedanata group company to make sure that the production lines remained shut.

The closure order has come after a gas leak was reported in the early hours on March 23.

Following emission of sulphur dioxide from Sterlite, people in the neighbourhood experienced unease and complained of suffocation, sneezing and burning sensation in the eye.

D. Dhanavel, General Manager, Projects, Sterlite Copper, said the closure order was received on Friday night.

An order was served by Revenue Divisional Officer of Tuticorin, K. Latha, to the company on March 24, seeking explanation for the incident within five days.

A team comprising Revenue Divisional Officer of Tuticorin, officials from the Pollution Control Board, Revenue and Tangedco has been carrying out inspections at the sulphuric acid plant, the phosphoric acid plant and other plants since 8 a.m., Ms. Latha said.

The Collector, when contacted, told The Hindu that power lines to the company were disconnected.

Tuticorin Tangedco Superintending Engineer, R. Amirtha Rathnakumar, said power was cut at 12.21 a.m. on Saturday.

Activists celebrate

Activists protesting against the functioning of the copper smelter celebrated the shutdown, but the company insisted that it had been in operation for 17 years with all requisite clearances and approvals.

It said it would explain the factual position to the TNPCB and cooperate fully with the authorities so that it could restart operations soon.

Calling it a victory for the local population, Vaiko, general secretary, MDMK, in a statement thanked Chief Minister Jayalalithaa for her decision to close down the smelter. He termed Sterlite as a ‘noxious industry’ causing harm to the lives of people. Pollution in all forms from Sterlite and its baneful effects impacted the livelihoods of farmers, fishermen and traders as farm lands turned unproductive and groundwater and seawater became unusable.

Chinua Achebe passed away

The Man who cried “My weapon is literature” is no more.

“Nobody can teach me who I am. You can describe parts of me, but who I am - and what I need - is something I have to find out myself.” ― Chinua Achebe

It was end of an era on Friday with the passing away of Chinua Achebe, one of the World's most admired literary figures.  It is to his credit that he rose from humble beginnings to make a name for himself in Africa and abroad. His writings have served and will continue to serve as an inspiring model for thousands of young African writers and even writers outside Africa.

 

National Shame

News brief in The Hindu dated 06-03-2013

In Chhattisgarh, tribal women retract rape charges

Of the six tribal women of Shamsetti village in Sukma district of Chhattisgarh who in 2009 gave statements in court that they had been gang-raped by Salwa Judum functionaries, three have now withdrawn their charges. Three key witnesses — family members of the women — have also retracted their statements.

Some lawyers in Dantewada familiar with the case say that the women are withdrawing due to “severe pressure” from several quarters. Many Salwa Judum members have now been inducted into the regular police force as constables.

The lawyers say that the remaining victims and witnesses may appear in court soon and retract their statements. “It is difficult to say whether their complaints were made under pressure or the withdrawal. But the way they are turning hostile it is a matter of time before the accused, who are on bail, are set free,” said Mamta Sharma, the chief public prosecutor at Dantewada court, who is defending the women.

“Clearly there is severe pressure on these women, else why would they retract their statements?” a lawyer said on condition of anonymity. Sudha Bharadwaj, the lawyer who represented the Shamsetti women in the Konta court where the statements were recorded, said the women and their relatives recorded their statements through a translator in 2009. “The magistrate did not record any unusual demeanour on their part. Surprisingly, in these cases the accused were granted bail even prior to withdrawal, meaning prosecution did not seriously oppose bail and no departmental enquiry, not that I know of, was carried out against the accused, who are State employees,” she said.

In December 2012, The Hindu reported about six tribal women who had come forward to lodge formal complaints of gang rape against Special Police Officers (SPO) of the now defunct anti-Maoist vigilante force Salwa Judum, amidst allegations of hundreds of rapes in the conflict-ridden south Chhattisgarh between 2005 and 2009. With some of them withdrawing their statements now, many in Dantewada, Chattisgarh, are asking if this was yet another instance of miscarriage of justice — one in which the State actively connived.

In the first week of February 2013, Mira and Sanika (names changed) retracted their statements in front of the sessions judge of Dantewada, A. K. Beck. According to their statements given in June 2009 before the judicial magistrate of Konta, Amrit Kerketta, both women, along with four others, had described how they were gang-raped in 2006 by seven SPOs of Sukma district. However, in their latest statements, copies of which are with The Hindu, Mira and Sanika stated that “nothing ever happened” to them. Mira said, “I never went to the police station to complain. I never submitted any complaint letter in the Konta court or made any statement in any court.”

The legal fraternity in Dantewads is questioning the validity of the retractions. “Are we to assume that the magistrate in Konta recorded false statements? Or that the women are faking statements now,” asked a lawyer.

An investigation by The Hindu revealed that one of the accused, Kwashi Mangalram, was picking up the complainants and witnesses from Shamsetti and bringing them to the court.

Mr. Mangalram denied the accusation and said he was not pressurising the women. An SPO-turned-peon in Dornapal School, he said, “I am inspired by Communist thought, you can check with CPI leaders. I am against such actions [rape].”

Last Saturday, at the Dantewada court, another complainant, Era (name changed), retracted her statement. When asked by the court if she knew one of the accused, Madkam Kama, a constable from Erabore, the young Muria Gond girl took a cursory look at him and denied having seen him before hurrying away. However, Era had accused Kama of rape four years ago in court. On Saturday, she denied having made a statement in 2009.

While Era was retracting her statements inside the court, four of the main accused, Kiche Nanda, Biddu Raja, Markam Kama, Kwashi Mangalram — all former SPOs — were seated on a bench outside. Nanda, who headed the dreaded Nanda group at the peak of the Salwa Judum movement, denied his involvement in the gang rape when he spoke to this correspondent in December. Markam Kama, another accused, also refuted the charges against him and said: “I am seeing this girl [Era] for the first time.”

Statue of rape accused adorns this Chhattisgarh village (The Hindu dated 06-03-2013)

At the peak of his career, Surya was accused of several cases of murder, rape and arson, though no formal complaint was lodged. He was made an accused, legally, by one of the women of Shamsetti who now has withdrawn her statement. The villagers claim that he used to visit Shamsetti often, carrying firearms, and threaten the residents quite openly.

A short but sturdy woman, wearing a golden nose ring and a white scarf came out of her mud house and looked straight at this correspondent. “Why have you come here,” she asked in a tone that was anything but polite. “To figure out why rape victims are retracting their statements in court,” we, a reporter from the local press and this correspondent, explained.

She was also told that there are reasons to believe that her name is Mira (name changed) — one of the six women who have retracted their allegation of rape against the Sukma SPOs.

“I have changed my statement,” she nodded in agreement. Asked why she did so, the woman said in almost flawless Hindi that “nothing ever happened” to her. “Because, I am not Mira, I am Madbi [name changed] and I do not know anything about Mira,” the woman said while moving away from us. But her recent statement identifies her as Mira alias Madbi and moreover, the 2009 statement in Konta court has her photograph on it, which establishes her identity, she was told. “How many more times will you people come to ask the same questions! Go away,” her voice choked as she disappeared into the room.

Her husband, Lakshman Soni (name changed) and the father in-law remained unmoved. A middle- aged man, who identified himself as the uncle of Mr. Soni, tried to calm things down. “It was a 2006 case; we had no plans to revive it. The human rights activists asked us to record our statements. Once the statements were recorded in 2009, everyone disappeared leaving us to deal [with the SPOs],” said a relative of the family.

The father of Era, another rape victim, also acknowledged that his wife and daughter went to the court to retract statements.

The villagers, however, did not deny that the entire village and the victims in particular were under ‘severe pressure’ for registering statements against the SPOs. The village next to Shamsetti, Misma, belongs to Kartam Surya — the most dreaded SPO-turned-constable of the area — who was killed in early 2012. At the peak of his career, Surya was allegedly involved in murder, rape and arson, though no formal complaint was lodged. He was made an accused, legally, by one of the women of Shamsetti who now has withdrawn her statement. The villagers claim that he used to visit Shamsetti often, carrying firearms, and threaten the residents quite openly. “He convinced the girls to withdraw their statements but he got killed,” said a villager who helped the women file the complaints.

His task has been taken up by Kwashi Mangalram, the former SPO who is now with the education department. Mangalram, himself an accused in the Shamsetti rape case, lives in another village adjacent to Shamsetti and ‘takes a stroll every now and then’ in the neighbourhood. Mira told The Hindu that she was ‘picked up from Shamsetti’ by Kwasi Mangalram to testify in court and retract her allegation. Other villagers corroborated her and said that he took the witnesses to court. Mangalram denied the allegation.

However, what Mangalram did not deny was his access to senior police officials in the district. Recently, to mark Kartam Surya’s death anniversary, Surya’s statue was installed in the town of Dornapal in the presence of Sukma’s SP Abhishek Shandilya. Video footage available with The Hindu establishes Mr. Shandilya’s presence at the installation programme, with Mangalram standing next to him.

Undisputed leader, says Sukma SP

Mr. Shandilya told The Hindu on phone that he felt there was “nothing wrong” in installing the statue in Dornapal. “He was the undisputed leader of the area and do not forget that anybody can be made an accused and slapped with false cases. However, the statue was financed by Surya’s family, but I was present at the programme,” he said.

He also said that Shamsetti women’s allegations are ‘false and motivated.’ “Four months back, I held a meeting in Misma, where people from other villages participated. They told me in clear terms that the allegations are false. It seems so to me as well.” Mr. Shandilya denied that the former SPOs were ‘pressurising’ the Shamsetti women to retract their statements.

“At the peak of the [Salwa Judum] movement if they [women] could go to court and file complaints [against SPOs], what stops them from fighting the case now, when there is complete calm in the area,” he asks. According to Mr. Shandilya, the women were “telling the truth now” by retracting their statements.

My letter to The Hindu dated 07-03-2013

This refers to the report “In Chhattisgarh, tribal women retract rape charges” (March 6). The retraction reinforces the constant struggle of tribal and Dalit women against sexual violence, used as a means to suppress them. That three out of six tribal women have withdrawn their charges against Salwa Judum functionaries, allegedly under pressure, implies that they are not worthy of protection from Indian laws and society. Adding insult to injury is the statue of a rape accused put up in Dornapal.

Can the accused be absolved and glorified even if the rape victims withdraw their charges? The treatment meted out to the women is in blatant disregard of human rights standards. The rape victims should have been provided adequate legal advice. Their allegations should be investigated by an agency which is not under the State police.

Enable the disabled!!!

The Hindu Editorial on the need to enable persons with disability(25-02-2013)

Taking freedom of mobility seriously

There are potentially huge benefits even for the able-bodied population in the Tamil Nadu government’s notification of rules to create special facilities for the disabled in urban local bodies. That makes the case stronger to embrace universal design across all construction activity. All multi-storeyed buildings with more than two floors that the public access on a regular basis are mandated to be equipped with ramps, lifts and other appropriate provisions under the new rules. Lest they should lead to arbitrary interpretation, the rules explicitly mention all educational institutions, health care and banking services, leisure and recreation facilities, shopping malls, industries and much else as falling within their purview. The measure will make a material difference in the lives of large numbers of people with locomotor impairments, for whom the constitutionally guaranteed right to freedom of mobility has all but remained notional. The commitments made in the relevant 1995 law for persons with disabilities have likewise by and large eluded them. But India’s demographic transition has brought into sharp focus a convergence between the needs of the population aged 60 years and above and those of the disabled. The elderly constitute 10.3 per cent of Tamil Nadu’s population, above the national average of close to 7.5 per cent, according to the 2010 Sample Registration System. The prevalence of age-induced ailments such as arthritis among this segment means the elderly, too, will benefit from the convenience of ramps and not just wheel-chair users.

Clearly, there is a large constituency out there — beyond legal definitions of disabilities — for which freedom of mobility is a real issue. That should once and for all rest the case against claims that the costs of special provisions for the disabled far outweigh the gains. Such an argument is at best a convenient cloak for inaction. It is also obvious that improvements in physical accessibility are only part of the long journey to ensure equality of opportunities for the disabled. Commensurate measures ought to be initiated in the arenas of education and employment. Training skilled personnel for sign-language interpretation for the hearing impaired, developing technologies for people with low-vision and the introduction of reasonable accommodation in the workplace are important among them. In their absence, the right to free and compulsory education would remain a mirage for children with impairments and the wider objective of an inclusive society. Ambitious as they seem, the Tamil Nadu rules stipulate a 180-day deadline for implementation. Other States in the country should follow this lead.

My Letter to The Hindu dated 26-02-2013

This refers to the editorial “Taking freedom of mobility seriously” (Feb. 25). Accessible environment is key to realising a society based on equality. The issue of accessibility and eliminating all types of barriers should be viewed as an issue of human rights of persons with disabilities. In modern societies with developed technologies, access to information and communication is a basic prerequisite. But a majority of information prepared for the public in print is not accessible to persons who have impaired vision because they are not printed in large fonts or in Braille, or they don’t have an audio version. Our education system is also biased as it excludes persons with disabilities from mainstream education. The field of employment is still an enormous barrier for a majority of persons with disabilities. The State should implement the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, 1995 fully to uplift the marginalised persons.

Shameless shootings!!

Licence to kill?

The widespread lack of accountability of the security forces either the police or the military    continues the culture of violations and denial of rights. Members of the police or military accused of violations have remained free to commit further violations. Even when    complaints are made, the government and its institutions have either exonerated or defended their men without conducting credible investigations. The cycle of violence and impunity is reinforced by excessive delays in the adjudication of cases against security forces. Even in cases involving the gross abuses of extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearance and torture, where the perpetrators have been identified and charged in court, the trials do not result in punishment as they do not progress. This is due to a lack of witnesses and evidence, a direct result of the police and prosecutors failure to effectively perform their duties.
The police have no authority to decide that a person's death or the manner he was killed was legitimate or not? The security forces have fundamental obligations to ensure protection of right to life. Deprivation of this right to life perpetrated by security forces is so grave and the government should take measure to prevent arbitrary killing by their own security forces. Concluding and deciding prematurely that the victim's death does not merit further investigation constitutes an excess of the police duty and usurping of the court's judicial power.
In a democracy, people should be treated equally before the law and they must have the same protection of the law, regardless of whether they are criminals, state officials or ordinary citizens. The singling out of any group as unworthy of legal protection is morally and legally illogical. Unfortunately, the notion of equality before the law is not often found in Indian criminal Justice system. While the Indian criminal justice system is meant to impartially hold persons guilty of crimes accountable for their actions, in reality it operates with a lot of prejudice. The government has failed to take effective measures to prevent its officers from the continuing practice of labeling persons and groups as being criminals, terrorists, which is often a precursor to these individuals or groups being the subject of attacks. The deprivation of life by the authorities of the State is a matter of utmost gravity. State should establish effective facilities and procedures to investigate thoroughly cases of biased police actions. The fundamental duty of the police is to effectively and with utmost credibility conduct investigation to any serious allegations involving policemen in killings and rights abuses. It is for the court to decide whether those involved should be held to account or not; or whether the killing is within the lawful premise.

For your reading the Article in the Hindu by Teesta Setalvad(20-02-2013)

Shamelessly shooting to kill

In the recent incidents at Dhule and Thangadh, the communal bias of the police was caught on camera and is there for anyone who cares to see

Images of the Delhi police lobbing tear gas shells at and using water canons on protesters at India Gate on a Sunday, December 23, 2012, who were agitating against the gang rape of a young girl are embedded in the nation’s psyche, courtesy of our omnipresent, 24x7 news networks, images sharpened further by the ever-prescient discussions on the 9 p.m. Newshour.

Not 14 days later, also on a Sunday, about a thousand kilometres away, in faraway north Maharashtra, the town of Dhule saw a distinctly more brutal police action; the rapid firing of SLR bullets to kill six young Muslims. It was a case of being caught at the wrong place at the wrong time.

They paid heavily with their young lives. In a similarly brutal and uncalled for police action at Thangadh in Surendranagar district, not far from Ahmedabad, four Gujarat officers using AK-47s had shot dead three Dalits, including a 17-year-old, on the night of September 22-23, 2012.

The tragedies, at Thangadh and Dhule, that had cost these precious lives, were however reduced to media sideshows, though the print editions of English language national dailies did spotlight some issues. The police, in Dhule, were caught on mobile phone videos in shameful acts. Yet, despite the availability of such sensationally thrilling clips, the normally avaricious and greedy eye of the television camera looked away. The shots slipped into late afternoon or midnight bulletins, cleverly bypassing the noisy news hour.

One of the Dhule clips shows a constable taking a self-loading rifle from his senior officer and aiming to shoot high above the waist. Bullet marks have been found in the market place and gullies of Macchipura a kilometre deep into the Muslim area, away from any groups that had gathered. Three such shots fired in quick succession got Imran Ali in his collarbone, eventually leading to his death. Of the 23 other young Muslim men who were critical, one had a bullet fired into his cheek, narrowly missing his eye, another rupturing a liver. Another clip shows a policeman ignoring calls for protection. Yet another shows policemen in uniform looting Muslim establishments that were being destroyed and burnt by some rioters.

In Thangadh, the four policemen later absconded.

Stephen Lawrence case

The murder, in 1993, of a black youth Stephen Lawrence, in the United Kingdom, and the publication, in 1999, of the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry report led to the critical acknowledgement that hate crimes are committed even by men in uniform and that such deeds demand institutional sensitisation and correction. What emerged was a Hate Crimes Manual that warned what constituted such practice.

Since the late 1980s, when evidence of deviant conduct by men in uniform surfaced from several bouts of targeted violence countrywide (Nellie, Assam, 1983 — 3,000 Muslims massacred; Delhi, 1984 — over 3,000 Sikhs systematically killed; Hashimpura, Uttar Pradesh, 1987 — 51 Muslims shot dead by the Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC); Bhagalpur, Bihar, 1989 — a massacre that left thousands dead and evidence buried below a hastily planted cauliflower field; Mumbai, 1992-1993 — over 1,200 dead; Kandhamal, Odisha, 2008 — nearly 100 Christians and Gujarat, 2002 — over 2,000 Muslims massacred), courts and judicial commissions have strongly indicted India’s police for harbouring a distinct anti-minority bias, committing crimes through a manifestation of this hatred and not being punished for it.

Studying police neutrality

In 1995, I had interviewed a senior IPS officer, V.N. Rai, who taken a year’s sabbatical to complete a research study, “Combating communal conflicts: Perception of police neutrality during Hindu-Muslim riots in India.” This interview was published in over 30 Indian publications. Among other things, Rai’s interviews with hundreds of riot victims from across the country (as part of his study) produced the startling finding that in all riot situations, Hindus consider policemen as their friends while, almost without exception, the minorities — Muslims and Sikhs — experience them as their enemy. This piece of work ought to have initiated the kind of self-reflection that the Stephen Lawrence murder had led the British police to. Instead, Rai’s study was ignored by the Indian police establishment. He had to find a private publisher to publish it as a book. What it did do however was lead to the issue being flagged by senior stalwarts. The founder and former chief of the Border Security Force (BSF), K.F. Rustomjee, and DIG Padma Rosha were quick to lend their voice to this issue of crucial concern, stressing that unless the Indian police confronted the issue of deep, communal (and caste) bias, they were sowing the seeds of bitter alienation. If Rai had conducted this study today, perceptions among the minorities would reflect alienation several degrees worse.

My interview covered several sensitive areas. I asked Rai specifically about the police’s criminal dereliction of duty on December 6, 1992, when the Babri Masjid was demolished as 3,000-4,000 men in uniform watched. His reply was a chilling recall of another fateful Sunday 21 years ago: “The video cassette recording by the Intelligence Bureau clearly documents that not more than 3,000-4,000 ‘kar sevaks’ were within close proximity of the mosque. In such a scenario, could no effective action have been taken? The reason why no action was taken lies elsewhere. The same cassette shows policemen rejoicing, with their hands held high in victory, when the Babri Masjid was destroyed. The district magistrate and other officials were dancing with delight. That is why the ‘kar sevaks’ could not be stopped. There was no desire to do so.” None of these offenders were punished.

Pitching strongly for the application of the principle of command responsibility when large-scale violence results following the failure to prevent or contain communal violence, Rai narrated the quotation “There are no bad soldiers, only bad generals.” So, leadership not only makes a substantial difference, it is the most vital, the most decisive factor in the functioning of a force whether we are talking of the police, the paramilitary or the army.

An officer to the rescue

Two decades after much soul-searching — that followed the cataclysmic events before and after the demolition of a 400-year-old mosque at Ayodhya — we are still only debating (and the establishment resisting) the chain of command responsibility being applied to men in uniform when it comes to serious offences, including sexual violence. Worse, there is a shrill resistance to enact legislative protection against the systematic outbreak of communal and targeted violence through a law that will penalise policemen who fail to preserve the peace.

Rai, in 1987, was the man who filed the First Information Report of the crimes committed by the PAC at Hashimpura. Fifteen years later, in 2002, in Gujarat’s Bhavnagar district, it was SP Rahul Sharma who charged ahead, firing to disperse a murderous Hindu mob when his men refused to act to prevent them attacking a madrassa. His prompt action saved the lives of 400 Muslim children. Today, he is at the receiving end of blows from a vindictive State government, facing every day harassment, charge sheets and worse.

Rai or Sharma are unlikely heroes for Republic Day bravery medals nor are they the likely face or voice of discussions on television channels. Their raw deeds and searching reflection spotlight a raw nerve, a deep-rooted prejudice that India at 65+ unfortunately lives quite comfortably with.

Another acid attack victim passed away

Condolences to Vidya!!

Incidents of acid attack reminds us of the urgency of strict enactment of Laws to protect women in this nation. Sensitisation camps alone can change the male psyche and perhaps not a ban on sale of acid.  As long as man fails to consider woman as the other half, these incidents will continue to happen and to be ignored.     

For your reading The Hindu Report(25-02-2013):

21-year-old acid attack victim succumbs to injuries

Vidya, the 21-year-old victim of an acid attack, died of injuries on Sunday at Government Kilpauk Hospital. The family donated her corneas to Sankara Nethralaya. Vidya is the second victim in the city to succumb to acid attack injuries in as many weeks. J. Vinodhini (23), a resident of Karaikal, had succumbed to wounds on February 13.

On January 30, Vidya was alone at an internet browsing centre on Tiruvalluvar Main Road in Adambakkam where she was working when S. Vijaya Bhaskar attacked her with a bottle of acid after she turned down his marriage proposal.

The accused, who was working as a catering staff in an IT company at Sholinganallur had hurled the bottle at her face, but she turned her face away.

An enraged Vijaya Bhaskar pushed her down and she fell on the floor where the acid had spilled.

“As she writhed in pain, he tried to escape…but her screams attracted people from neighbouring shops. They beat him up and handed him over to the police,” her brother Vijay said.

Vidya’s father Jayaseelan died when she was seven years old.

Her mother Saraswathi is working as a domestic help. Vidya, who had been working at the centre for two years, was earning Rs. 4,000 a month and a major contributor to the family income.

As Vidya’s clothes were damaged a woman from a nearby house covered her with a sari before the victim was rushed to a private hospital and then to Government Kilpauk Hospital.

On Saturday, her condition worsened and doctors put her on ventilator. Her end came around 4.15 a.m. on Sunday, after battling for life for 25 days.

“Poor hospital hygiene”

Family members blamed the poor hospital hygiene for her death. “There is no intensive care unit. She was lying on a cot that was stained in her own pus. We had to buy a new bed sheet for her and sprayed perfume to prevent the stench,” her uncle Rajan alleged.

It was only around 11 a.m. that the post-mortem was done.

As news of her death spread, women groups gathered at the hospital’s mortuary.

The family refused to take possession of the body until government officials spoke to them.

“They have not responded to our appeal aired through media. In the case of the Delhi victim, the girl was taken to Singapore for treatment. Even in the case of Vinodhini, a Minister called on her. Nobody has come to our aid,” he said.

Finally, around 3.30 p.m., the family agreed to shift Vidya’s body to their home in Parameswari Nagar in Adambakkam. Kancheepuram Collector L. Sitherasenan visited the family later in the evening.