SANSAD News-release, November 12, 2016

Dismiss false charges against human rights defenders

South Asian Network for Secularism and Democracy (SANSAD), an organization of the South Asian Diaspora in Canada, utterly deplores the shocking charges of “criminal conspiracy” and “murder” laid against Nandini Sundar, professor of sociology at Delhi University, professor Archana Prasad of Jawaharlal Nehru University, several political rights and adivasi rights activists and others by Chattisgarh police on October 5.

These charges were laid in regard to the killing of adivasi villager, Shamnath Baghel by Maoists in Nama village in Bastar on the night of October 4. According to the police they were laid in response to the naming of the accused by Shamnath’s wife, Vimala Baghel. However, Vimala  Baghel has said in an interview with NDTV that she did not recognize any of the armed attackers and had been instructed by the police to not talk to outsiders and the media.

These absurd charges against professors Sundar and Prasad and others engaged in bringing to light the atrocities of the police and the adivasis militia armed by the police against other adivais suspected of sympathizing with Maoists is only the latest episode in a long campaign to “pacify” the tribals who are resisting the destruction of their land and forest habitat by mining companies. Nandini Sundar has been exposing the fake encounters, rapes, custodial torture and deaths for more than ten years. In 2007 she, Ramchandra Guha, and E. A. S. Sharma had filed a Public Interest Litigation in the Supreme Court against Salwa Judum, an armed militia set up by the police, leading to the Supreme Court’s banning of  this organization as unconstitutional. In May 2016 Sundar and others had visited Nama village on a fact finding  mission to investigate atrocities and published a report that was critical of both the police and Maoists.

It is standard procedure for states to impose information blackout in areas where state terror is used against the people, whether it be to crush the resistance to resource extraction or the demand for autonomy. The absence of information is then filled with propaganda that justifies the repression. This is amply illustrated by developments in India, nowhere more clearly than in the tribal belt and Kashmir. These practices were pioneered by colonial powers, who also developed the tactic of arming and empowering one section of the oppressed group against the other.

There has been an escalation of attacks against human rights defenders, journalists, and academics reporting on atrocities in Chattisgarh in the past year: adivasi human rights activist Soni Sori had acid thrown on her face following intense hararssment on February 20, and at the same time the Jagdalpur Legal Aid Group faced a campaign of intimidation and eviction that forced them to leave the area. Journalist Malini Subramanian and social scientist Bela Bhatia too faced similar harassment compelling them to leave the area where they had been investigating atrocities. As in the events of February the false charges against Nandini Sundar and others flow  from the recent  Central Bureau of Investigation charge sheet against special police officers in Chattisgarh finding them responsible for burning down three villages in 2011 for which initially Maoists had been blamed. The charge sheets had been immediately followed by the burning of effigies of Nandini Sundar and other human rights activists by armed auxiliary forces personnel across Bastar range under the direction of the police.

As civil society groups in India have recognized in a series of statements and meetings the intense attack on all efforts to bring to light the atrocities committed by the police against adivasis is taking place today within a general assault on civil society. Freedom of information, enquiry, and expression is severely under stress in India today.

We demand that the false charges against Nandini Sundar, Archana Prasad and others be immediately withdrawn.

We further demand that an independent fact finding mission be established to investigate the atrocities in Chattisgarh.

—Thirty—

South Asian Network for Secularism and Democracy (SANSAD), www.sansad.org

SANSAD News-release Sept 16, 2016

Deplore the silencing of journalists

SANSAD strongly deplores the ongoing effort to censor journalists critical of the policies of the Indian government and to manipulate the media addressing the South Asian diaspora in Vancouver, BC.

On September 6, 2016 Shiv Inder Singh, an independent journalist working out of Punjab and reporting on several radio stations across Canada, published an open letter protesting his arbitrary suspension as a daily reporter on Radio Red-FM in Vancouver, BC for his criticism of Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi.

Mr. Shiv Inder Singh had been working on Radio Red-FM since 2014, providing daily reports and commentary on political developments in India. He has been critical of the rise of religious intolerance under Mr. Modi and the poor human rights record of his ruling Hindu nationalist Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP).

Lately Mr. Singh had found himself in on-air altercation with the host of an evening show and had brought this to the attention of the CEO of the radio station without finding any redress. The conflict had come to a crisis on July 27, when Mr. Singh criticized the politics behind the Government of India’s celebration of the anniversary of a minor military incident between India and Pakistan. Following this Mr. Singh found himself suspended without explanation and received no satisfaction when he sought one from the CEO. Some Vancouver-based individuals who approached the CEO regarding the matter were told that Mr. Singh had been taken off air because of complaints regarding his criticism of Narendra Modi and the Indian Army.

This is not the first incident of such silencing. In 2014 Gurpreet Singh, a respected journalist who had been working in Radio India as a host since 2001 had to resign when he was reprimanded for interviewing the organizers of a Sikh group planning a protest against the visit of Narendra Modi to the US to address the UN following his election as Prime Minister of India. Mr. Modi previously had been banned from visiting the US after the pogrom against Muslims in Gujarat in 2002 when he was the Chief Minister of the state. Gurpreet Singh was ordered to praise Modi instead of allowing airtime to his critics, compelling his resignation.

SANSAD believes that journalistic independence and freedom of the press are essential foundations of democracy and utterly deplores all attacks on journalists and press freedom. The silencing of Shiv Inder Singh and Gurpreet Singh is deplorable as an attempt to remove any critical perspective from the media serving the South Asian diaspora.

-Thirty-

South Asian Network for Secularism and Democracy (SANSAD), www.sansad.org

SANSAD News-release February 24, 2016

Stop genocidal atrocities against Adivasis (tribals) in India

South Asian Network for Secularism and Democracy (SANSAD) condemns the “acid” attack on Adivasi human rights activist, Soni Sori by unknown persons in Bastar  district of Chattishgarh on February 20 and the eviction from their home and office of the lawyers in Jagdalpur Legal Aid Group (Jag-LAG) through police intimidation earlier on the same day. We further condemn the driving out from the state by police intimidation of the journalist Malini Subramaniam a few days earlier and the continuing police harassment and intimidation of social scientist, Bela Bhatia, formerly teacher at Tata Institute for Social Sciences, Mumbai, for her writings on the sexual harassment and gang-rapes of Adivasi women by security personnel.

These events are a part of the war the Indian state is waging against Adivasis in Chattisgarh to “pacify” this region of largely forest lands rich in mineral resources for mining, though the overt character of the operation is that of a counter-insurgency against the armed struggle led by the CPI (Maoist). A major aspect of this operation is the intimidation and incarceration of people on the charge of being associated with or sympathetic to the Maoists, who spearhead the resistance of adivasis, while others include individual or mass killings under the guise of fake encounters, looting, rapes, and gang rapes. Following the colonial textbook of counter insurgency one section of the Adivasis is privileged and organized as an arm of the state for violence and intimidation. Also following the textbook of such operations of state violence information is strictly controlled and observation and reporting are violently discouraged.

Soni Sori, a school teacher, had been arrested in 2011 on the false charge of being associated with Maoists and spent two years in prison, where she was brutally  tortured, till she was released on bail by the Supreme Court in 2013. At the same time Lingaram Kodopi, her nephew a journalist who had exposed a massacre, was also imprisoned, served two years, and was similarly released. Since their release both Sori and Kodopi have been active in the defense of the human rights of Adivasis. Soni Sori, who has been leading the campaign for human rights in the region has faced continuous harassment and intimidation, including threats of being burnt alive. None of these incidents have been investigated. The  attack with chemicals on February 20 that led to Sori being taken to hospital emergency in New Delhi  with burns and swelling on her face followed a failed attempt by  her to lodge a police complaint against the Bastar Range Inspector General of Police S. R. P. Kalluri for intimidation.

The case of Soni Sori had alerted lawyers to the plight of Adivasis in Chattisgarh, four of whom were activated to move from New Delhi to Jagdalpur, where they set up the Jagdalpur Legal Aid Group in 2013. They were the only lawyers the Adivasis had had to take up their cases. The Jag-LAG lawyers discovered that hundreds of Adivasis were held in appalling conditions in severely overcrowded jails for many years without any legal representation, without bail, and without ever understanding the charges and proceedings that were in a language they did not understand. One jail with a capacity of 65 held more than 600 inmates, another with a capacity of 150 held 500. Between  2005 and 2012 ninety five percent of the cases had been dismissed, with most people being held in prison for 6 years before acquittal. These lawyers, who offered the only hope for the Adivasis of Chattisgarh and were currently working on 40 cases in addition to the defense of two journalists, Somaru Nag and Santosh Yadav who had been arrested in July 2015, were hounded out on February 20 when their landlord was intimidated by the police into evicting them.

Malini Subramaniam, who had lived in Jagdalpur since 2011, first as an aid worker with the International Committee fro the Red Cross and then as a journalist writing for Scroll.in, was similarly hounded out after relentless harassment by the police and Samajik Ekta Manch, a vigilante group associated with the police. She had been reporting on the protests against fake encounters, rapes and sexual violence by security forces, and fake surrenders by alleged Maoists. After weeks of intimidation by the police and the vigilante group she was given an immediate eviction notice by her landlord and forced to leave with her husband and two daughters on February 18. The crisis was precipitated by the publication in the Caravan magazine of the link between the police and the Bastar Samajik Ekta Manch the previous day.

We utterly condemn the atrocities of the Indian state in Chattisgarh that amount to what is today recognized as colonial and post-colonial genocide perpetrated in the course of counter-insurgency measures. We further condemn the systematic campaign of terror used to suppress the struggle for human rights and maintain an information blackout in the area. We demand that the human rights of the Adivasis and their democratic rights as citizens of India be respected, the paramilitary groups be disarmed and restrained, the rule of law be established, an independent investigation be conducted into the abuses by the police and security forces, and journalists and lawyers be assured the safety they need to perform their essential role in a democratic society.

—Thirty—

Board of Directors, SANSAD: www.sansad.org