A Chhattisgarh court condemns the good doctor to life imprisonment. Let this brazen injustice not go unchallenged Amit Sengupta Delhi
The horrifying verdict of life imprisonment for Dr Binayak Sen, accused of unimaginable crimes such as treason and sedition, has come as a real new low in the dirty quagmire of a litany of injustices in this fragmented and corrupt, largest democracy in the world. It will immediately polarise the civil society with a collective howl of protest against this brazen injustice and the recharged longing for justice so brazenly denied to someone called 'the good doctor' all over the world. The judgement will definitely sharpen the solidarity of all sensitive, secular and democratic opinion in India and across the world, and prove the brazenly undemocratic and fascistic character of the BJP regime in Chhattisgarh, who went about concocting false charges against Dr Sen, despite almost no tangible evidence.
Raipur District and Sessions Court judge BP Varma on Friday found Dr Sen guilty on a variety of counts and also under the Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act.
According to the latest dispatch from PUCL General Secretary Kavita Srivastava from Raipur: "By now you all must have got to know about the conviction of Dr Binayak Sen u/s of 120(B), 124(A) of the IPC and 1,2,3,5, Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act and Sec 39 (2) of the UAPA (2004 amended). Binayak was taken away immediately into custody. He was extremely equanimous. It was an emotional moment for Dr Sen's daughters and brother Dipanker Sen. His wife, Professor Ilina Sen, is upset but thinking ahead...
Said Prof Sen, "It is a sad day for me. It is a sadder day for Indian democracy. They had no evidence, nothing to prove the charges. They even termed me an ISI agent (ISI turned out to be the Indian Social Institute in Delhi). This is injustice and it's for all to see."
"This judgement is really unacceptable and unconstitutional. After all, two of the laws under which he has been convicted are themselves being questioned as far as their constitutional validity is concerned... We need to really build a campaign again. There was really no evidence," said Kavita Srivastava.
Dr Binayak Sen will appeal in the High Court at the earliest, though the court, in an uncanny timing of the judgement, will go on vacation from December 25. The other two co-accused, Piyush Guha and Narayan Sanyal, have also been convicted. Some extra sections have been applied to Sanyal, accused of being a Maoist leader.
Most human rights activists, academics and even journalists who have covered the long imprisonment of Dr Sen in the past have reacted with utmost horror at the sheer injustice of the judgement, despite such widespread public opinion and factual evidence against the false cases against Dr Sen by the BJP-led regime in Chhattisgarh. "This is bizarre, shocking, inhuman, unjust, absolutely incomprehensible. How can the judge do that? How can they so publicly demonstrate such irrational behaviour? Such brazen injustice?" - this is the kind of remorse and anger flowing out of all over the country after the shocking judgment.
From university campuses to newspaper offices to middle-class homes and power corridors across India, this is a judgement which is seen to be clearly destroying the last edifices of the public perception of the Indian justice system, the faith in the judiciary and the idea of justice, and the faith which the civil society has on the edifices of democracy. "All kinds of scamsters and mass murderers are all over the power establishment and a man who lived and worked for the poor all this life, he is charged with sedition. What utter nonsense is this," said a JNU student.
Said Thomas Kocherry, leader of the National Fishermen's Federation, in a bulk email from Cochin: "Let us send out protest letters to the Chhattisgarh court and the state government and send out this to the whole world. It is unjust. An innocent man is arrested again. Is there any justice in this country? We have to keep protesting till Binayak Sen gets justice. We cannot keep quiet. We have to fight for the rights of the people. We cannot organise the people. This is the character of the BJP government in Chhattisgarh. Another Emergency is in the making in MP."
Dr Sen is currently a professor at the prestigious Christian Medical College (CMC), Vellore, of which he is an eminent alumni. The entire alumni of CMC had petitioned for his release during his imprisonment. At least 22 noble prize winners from all over the world had sought his immediate freedom and lauded the exemplary work Dr Sen had in the medical sciences, in popularising it among the poorest of the poor, and in providing the best of treatment to the impoverished adivasis in the Hindi heartland. Distinguished artists, academics, filmmakers and writers like Sudhir Mishra, Noam Chomsky, Romila Thapar, Arundhati Roy, Sumit Sarkar, Tanika Sarkar, Dilip Simeon, Praful Bidwai, Sanjay Kak, among others, had campaigned and petitioned for his freedom. Even Sri Sri Ravishankar had visited him at Raipur jail and sought his release, even as singers like Rabbi and Indian Ocean, and students from all across India and the world, organised protests, campaigns and concerts demanding freedom for the good doctor. In fact, the website www.binayaksen.net became an international forum for a vigorous and relentless campaign.
"This campaign will become national and global soon. This is certain. We start with a list of all those who have not been given life imprisonment for sedition and treason, including scamsters, criminals and mass murderers who call the shots in the Indian power establishment. We all know their names. Their names will be put up on the website. And the mass protests all over the world against the brazen injustice will start from now, right now, at this moment," said Satya Sivaraman, journalist, filmmaker and activist, who was one of the key catalysts in the campaign last time. This, when news is still trickling in, and a global and national web and sms campaign is already underway. Indeed, TV channels are already moving in with the news.
'Free Dr Binayak Sen.' 'Freedom for the good doctor.' Surely, the old slogans are coming back.
Published: December 24, 2010 14:41 IST | Updated: December 24, 2010 17:22 IST Raipur, December 24, 2010
Binayak Sen, 2 others sentenced to life
PTI
Rights activist Binayak Sen, Naxal ideologue Narayan Sanyal and Kolkata businessman Piyush Guha were on Friday convicted for sedition and sentenced to life imprisonment for colluding with Maoists to establish a network to fight the state.
Additional District and Sessions Judge B.P. Verma held the trio, who were present in the jam-packed courtroom, guilty under provisions of section 124A (sedition)and 120 B (conspiracy) of IPC and Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act.
The 58-year-old Dr. Sen, a paediatrician by training and vice-president of the People’s Union of Civil Liberties, had been accused by the prosecution of acting as courier for Sanyal, who was in jail, by carrying his messages and letters to the underground Maoists.
Dr. Sen was arrested on May 14, 2007 from Bilaspur and was in jail for two years before being granted bail by the Supreme Court in May last year.
Sanyal, 67, was arrested in Khammam in Andhra Pradesh in January 2006, while Guha, 35, was nabbed a year later in May. Both have been in jail with the prosecution having charged them with helping Maoists to set up a network.
Mahendra Dubey, Dr. Sen’s lawyer, said they will appeal against the verdict. “This kind of judgement was not expected by us,” he said.
All the three were sentenced to life imprisonment under sections 124A and 120(B) of IPC. The trio were also found guilty under Section 8(1) of Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act and awarded two years imprisonment and a fine of Rs. 1,000.
They were sentenced to one year imprisonment and Rs. 1000 fine under section 8(2) of the state Act, to three years prison term and a fine of Rs. 1000 under section 8(3) of that Act and to five years imprisonment and fine of Rs. 1000 under its Section 8(5), Mr. Dubey said.
All the three were also found guilty under provisions of Prevention of Unlawful Activities Act and sentenced upto five years jail term and a fine of Rs. 1,000 each. Sanyal was also awarded 10 years imprisonment and a fine of Rs. 2,000 under Section 20 of the Act.
The sentences will run concurrently, Mr. Dubey said.
Dr. Sen’s wife Elina and rights activists expressed “shock” and “disappointment” over the verdict.
“It is completely irrational. It is not a judgement that I would agree with,” Ms. Elina Sen said. “We will take whatever legal recourse is available to us. We will not be able to do it immediately because higher courts are on vacation.”
Ms. Elina Sen, who was present in the court during the trial, claimed, “Not a single piece of evidence came up to support this kind of conviction — sedition and conspiracy against the state. I hope justice will prevail.”
Swami Agnivesh said the verdict was “unacceptable“.
“I find it unacceptable that Sen has been charged with sedition. We will appeal in the High Court. This judgement has definitely come as a shock to all human rights activists and people who have been working for the poor,” he said.
Amit Banerjee, another defence lawyer, claimed, “There is no evidence against Sanyal that he is a Naxalite.”
Press Release by PUCL on Dr. Binayak Sen's Conviction
Friday, December 24, 2010 at 7:32pm
Delhi/ Raipur,
The People's Union for Civil Liberties is deeply disappointed at the miscarriage of justice reflected in the judgement of Raipur Additional District and Sessions Judge B. P. Verma sentencing our National Vice President Dr. Binayak Sen to life imprisonment under charges of sedition 124 (A) of the IPC read with conspiracy (120-B IPC) along with convicting him concurrently u/s 8-(1), (2), (3) and (5) of the Chhattisgarh Vishesh Jan Suraksha Adhiniyam,2005 (Chhattisgarh Special Public Safety Act, 2005) and u/sec 39 (2) of the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act, 2004 (amended). It is a sad day for the PUCL and all human rights defenders in the country and a black day for the Indian Judiciary.
Dr. Binayak Sen was charged with being a courier of letters from co-accused Narayan Sanyal to Piyush Guha. All through the trial not a single Jail authority appearing as prosecution witness confirmed this. In fact, there was no substantive evidence to confirm any of the allegations of the prosecution.
The PUCL holds that Dr Binayak Sen is a victim of the vendetta of the Chhattisgarh government for his bold and principled opposition to state sponsored vigilante operation Salwa Judum, which has been held unacceptable even by the Supreme Court. His conviction is one more example of the state succeeding in securing the conviction of an innocent person on the basis of false evidence. It is an occasion for the nation to demand drastic reform of the criminal justice system to ensure that it is not manipulated by the state to persecute, prosecute and victimize innocent persons.
The PUCL will continue to work towards Dr. Binayak Sen release and take all legal measures in this regard. It will also work towards building public opinion against the ongoing persecution of activists and Human Rights Defenders in the country.
Sh. Gursharan Singh (noted peoples Dramatist), Convener, Democratic Front Against Operation Green Hunt, Punjab, addressing the Convention
A section of the Audience
A section of the Audience
Sh Gursharan Singh in wheel chair, blessing the Cycle Yatra
Beginning of Cycle Yatra
Sh. Gursharan Singh coming to Convention venue at Chandigarh
Sh. Gursharan Singh, Prof Ajmer Aulakh, Prof A.K.Maleri presenting the poster issued to commemorate the beginning of the Democratic Front's compaign against Operation Green Hunt
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
IN DEFENSE OF THE BITCH ......
By Trevor Selvam 28 March, 2010 Countercurrents.org
(Recently a lengthy article titled 'WALKING WITH THE COMRADES', written by noted writer Arundhati Rai was published in OUTLOOK. In this article she described in detail her experience of visits to Dantewada and other places currently covered by Operation Green Hunt. It was widely appreciated, but some people, particularly on the Internet, spewed venom against Arundhati Roy after reading it. Here we are publishing a reaction to it by Trevor Selvam which appeared on Countercurrents.org )
For the past few years, I have seen the hate that has been spewed out at Arundhuti Roy. There are various categories of Indian men and women who do not like her. Let us deal with the men first, as their hatred (camouflaged or obvious) for an intelligent female writer is nearly reflexive. Women on the other hand do not seem to have their hate mongering so mordant and merciless and generally do not spew out sexist hatred.
So, by all accounts she is a bitch, a cunt, a Muslim arse-licker and so much more. Who are these people who have such wonderful things to say about her? In the beginning I would not bother to read the responses and letters to various articles on the web. Now, I do scan through them, unpalatable as most of them are. Because they reflect on the psyche of the nation. They mirror the incredible mental descent and cultural depravity of a post-Bollywood, web-savvy class, cut off from historical precedent, unaware of India’s socio-economic past, unaware of rational, sensible discourse and debate, ignorant about India’s own philosophical traditions, let alone world history-- about colonization and the genocide against aboriginal people. What vitriol, filth and misogyny runs through the veins of these Indians! When Sarojini Naidu, Aruna Asaf Ali, Mridula Sarabhai and other women spoke and wrote essays about their feelings about the people of India not a single misogynist invective was hurled at them. Today, when Medha Patkar, Vandana Shiva, Arundhuti Roy, Nandini Haksar and even Sania Mirza reflect on their experiences, Indian men of the above variety unleash their religious, sexual, tribal, super-nationalist, obscurantist prejudices immediately.
So, first there are the flag waivers and false-pride upholders of the Bharat Shining Bajrang Brigade. No matter what, for these people, there are certain aspects about their notion of India that immediately induces a knee-jerk response. And they have been toilet trained from birth to have this Pavlovian response. They must defecate on intelligent, conscious, articulate women who bring the facts out bluntly. With them you don’t bring up issues like India’s miserable record after 62 years of independence in literacy, social hygiene, health, body mass index of 80% of the population, female survival rate, diarrheal deaths, farmer suicides, mass deforestation (except in Maoist areas as agreed upon by the GOI) human development index (in the sub Sahara category), mass increase in poverty, (please do not compare with China or Brazil—because China doctors the numbers, no matter what and Brazil is a flash in the pan!! Even though the UN and the Economist have praised their performance in these areas in the last five years). So for them, Arundhuti Roy is a bitch. And they say so in responses to blogs, websites, newsline sites etc. They have no use for her. Rather than deal with the irrefutable facts and the content of what she raises, they end up fermenting in an anti-intellectualist bog. Responses sprinkled with undertones of religious and communalist hatred are rolled out. Like Barack Obama had to deal with his middle name of Hussein, Arundhuti has to deal with Suzanna. Like the USA has its pot bellied, red-necked, tea party activists shouting “nigger socialist” at Obama, India’s pan-chewing inarticulate Modi-men call her a Christian-Commie bitch.
Then there are the other men and some women, who say they have a problem with her politics! They write the blogs. They are guest columnists. They say she is “sleepwalking”, “moonwalking”, that she is romanticizing tribals, that she is exploiting her Booker fame and going where she does not have acumen and others do! She is pushing the boundaries of journalism, rushing to immature conclusions, raising issues that should not be discussed or have been thrashed out in the annals of deconstructionist academic journals or need to be understood in the terminology of Eurocentric terminology from a hundred years gone by. They talk about the “rumours of Maoism,” the discourse of counter-terrorism, warning about not being influenced by the discourse of insurgency and substitutionalist rhetoric, because it has become sophisticated and unlike the times of Birsa Munda and Sidhu Kanu. In those times when the Brits called anyone “badmash” they were really meaning peasant militants and “dacoit village” meant a community that was in a mood of resistance. Today, they warn, there is a Maoist discourse that overshadows the tribal voice. So, whatever you hear, even if you have been there and talked to ground level tribal activists and villagers, it is still coloured by Maoist rhetoric. Who is whitewashing whom? The Adivasis have become automatons in the hands of the Maoists! Like the blue skinned avatars with long tails, they need urban-skinned, wheel chair bound (many skirmishes in many journals!) what-nuts to show the way! Because, there is no unfiltered tribal discourse anymore. It is all elite discourse. And all this is expertly analyzed and blogged-out from Delhi and Mumbai (without venturing out once to Maoist guerrilla zones) while holding on dearly to obscurantist and pedantic rhetoric from the time of Leon Trotsky. If there is any group or cult that latches on to a Marxist nameplate and lobs stones and pebbles from collapsing rooftops at the masses below, it is this variant. They have a handful of disconnected souls, desperately seeking a space on the “negotiating table with PCC” through statements of disunity, discovering the theory of “sandwiches”, appearing regal-like on TV panels with the nutjob circus of Arnab and Barkha and through their hobbit-like blogs.
And for these folks, suddenly, unconditional non-violence has become gospel. It is somewhat pedestrian, is it not, to suggest that violence must be a last resort? Do these folks really believe that the Maoist organizers have a pathological need to initiate violence? Do they really think that the last few years of active and physical dispossession instituted by the state and police forces, have been carried out with benign persuasion? Do these folks really comprehend the nature of the sadness and deprivation that Adivasis have had to contend with for decades, before there was some sort of organized resistance which led to some minimum gains, which they now want to defend? Sometimes, if it were not for the complicated academic language they use, their logic is no different from that in the mainstream media, whose definitions of violence, “caught in-between”, democracy, upholding the recourse to legal institutions seem paranormally identical. It is like there is no difference between the rant of the Times of India and the refined sardonic comments of those who want to cut down Arundhuti Roy in their fussy, chintzy blogs. They want to call her a bitch too. But they won’t. So they say she moonwalks and sleepwalks; like an imbecile, like a whiny errant spoilt girl, like a non-academic truant who has not studied their gospels on Permanent Revolution.
In the beginning they said, that Naxalites have not given up the tactics of annihilation, although if they bothered to read carefully through the documents of the Maoists, the old annihilation politics had long ago been dispensed with. In those days, small groups of individuals, invariably with college cadre forming a sizable section would swoop down on a local jotedar or landlord without initiating any mass movement or mass activity in the region. The idea was that “action” would create mass initiative and interest. Today, the Maoists reportedly use execution only after there has been a verdict passed in the Local government (Janathan Sarkar). Of course, one could be totally cynical about such exercises, but would that not be a flagrant case of urban elitism? Sometimes, the tribal community has been far more insistent on instituting violent retribution than the guerrilla units themselves. Whenever an informer is executed, especially those who have been responsible for killing Maoists and tribal sympathizers by bringing in the police and the COBRA/EFR/CRPF, the media and their “left” wing democratic proselytizers have ridiculed the process of arriving at such “peoples’ court” decisions, without investigating on the ground. The incident becomes the politics, and the perfunctory analysis of the incident becomes the planted discourse. No effort is made to find out what was behind the incident. That cadres and leaders of the CPI(M) operate as police informers and “dalals” is not a major mystery for the people in these areas. But, for these “left” wing bloggers, who until yesterday denied the existence of aboriginal people ,(only 8% of the population thanks to centuries of genocide against them), “now tribals are killing tribals.” Then they started writing articles that said “It will be hard to find a single Bhattacharya, Banerjee, Mukherjee, Basu or such like among the dead.” Well, that has also started happening. As of yesterday a top Maoist squad leader Bikram alias Abhisek Mukherjee — a former Jadavpur University student—was killed along with three other rebels in an encounter with COBRA commandos in Hathilot forest of Jangalmahal’s Lakhanpur on Thursday night. Either way you are damned. Whether it is Adivasis or non-Adivasis. Even crocodiles, if they could, would sue for the usage of their non-existent tears by such charlatans.
In the beginning they said, that these Maoists do not seem to build any mass movements. It is all secretive and militarist. Then articles started appearing about twenty years of sustained land distribution, cooperative farming, tax collection and distribution, medical clinics, irrigation programs, alternative energy and environmental programs, literacy campaigns, mobile health clinics and the participation of ten of thousands of people. Pictures started appearing of mass gatherings (never mind Arundhuti Roy’s pictures of the Bhumkal celebrations). Do mass movements have to be urban trade union organizations, petition campaigns and “Maidan Chullo” processions only?
In the beginning they said Maoists do not have any urban presence, they do not have any support amongst city intellectuals. They even ruefully said, it’s not like the old Naxalite days! Belatedly they have started a campaign to attack those intellectuals who have stated their clear cut opposition to the policies of the Indian government and in support of the Maoists. They are discovering that more and more city intellectuals and academics find that it is more important to oppose the government’s proto-fascist tactics than to criticize the Maoists for their failings. So they have started attacking these progressive intellectuals through their blogs, writings and attempted caricatures of the Maoists.
In the beginning they also said the Maoists had no tribal and women leaders and when the State started killing Maoist commanders who were women and tribals, and there were more and more spokespersons of tribal origins speaking through mass organizations, they started saying that they do not have any women in their Politburo!
What Arundhuti Roy has been saying for the past several years is nothing new to the Maoists. For years they have been trying to bring to the forefront (their media consciousness and ability to engage the interest of mainstream journalists, domestic and international, is relatively new) ---is the collapse of the possibilities of bringing about social change in India though regular mechanisms. India does not have the organs to promote social equity anymore. They have collapsed completely since the neo-liberalist drive to convert the entire Indian economy into a “do it or otherwise” coercive entity subservient to a handful of large anti-environmentalist business houses. India’s parliament is a sty, full of criminal millionaires. The Congress Party has been running the Salwa Judum and their new avatar, the SPO force. Who is going to negotiate with those who have knives to the throats of the Adivasis? Who is kidding who about exhausting legal channels for change? Where is the scope for challenging national laws that permit USA-like detention without trial systems? Even the Supreme Court’s verdict to produce missing Adivasis within 24 hours has gone completely ignored. Where is the mechanism for implementing seriously the various commissions on minority status and women’s status? Everyone knows that passing bills in Assembly and Parliament are symbolic gestures.
One can dispute many of the tactics of the Maoists and one can critique many of their actions, but it is time for India’s intellectuals to comprehend that diminishing and ridiculing the stand taken by Arundhuti Roy will be a permanent scar on the evolving history of this nation. She is merely stating that the regular channels for genuine change in India are exhausted. Someone has to state this very clearly. That those who are attempting alternate methods are being violently suppressed. And it is their story that she wants to tell. It is time for all the alternative left and democratic opposition to come together on a common platform (even if they disagree on many issues) and jointly oppose this horrendous Green Hunt that is in full swing now, before full scale massacres start happening.
