ARREST OF JHARKHAND PUCL ACTIVIST SANTOSH YADAV - AN UNDEMOCRATIC ACT OF BIHAR & JHARKHAND POLICE

STATEMENT AGAINST ARREST OF JHARKHAND PUCL ACTIVIST SANTOSH YADAV

            We are deeply shocked at the arrest of Sh. Santosh Yadav, a PUCL activist of Palamau District of Jharkhand, by Bihar Police and subsequently handing him over to Jharkhand Police, in a case registered in the year 2001. He had gone to village Dhangaon in Bihar to attend the last rites of a distant relative, whom police alleged to be the maternal grand-mother of a Maoist. It is pertinent to mention here that all other accused in the case slapped against Santosh Yadav have already been tried and acquitted. The complainant in this case appeared before the Chief Judicial Magistrate, and stated that he has got nothing against Santosh Yadav and does not want to pursue the case against him. But the police insisted on trying him.

          Actually the Jharkhand Police and the vigilante groups formed by it are inimical towards Santosh Yadav for his role as a defender of human rights of the people. He has been in the fore-front in the fight against police excesses, such as encounter killings, custodial deaths, false implication in criminal cases, attacks on democratic & struggling people, and expropriation of Jharkhand’s natural wealth by big Indian & foreign companies in Palamau and adjoining districts of Bihar. He has been an active and important member of various Fact Finding teams constituted by Coordination of Democratic Rights Organizations, which went to Jharkhand to probe and document, human rights violations by para-military forces.

           In one of its recent visits, the CDRO Fact Finding Team has documented one case where one poor farmer Rajinder Yadav was arrested by Daltonganj police on 1^st January 2010. He was brutally tortured at first in Police Station and thereafter at the residence of the then SP Sh. Jatin Narwal, resulting in his death. The police, in order to suppress its crime wanted to dispose of the body of the deceased after obtaining a false post-mortem report from a panel of doctors of Civil Hospital Daltonganj, claiming that there was no external injury or sign of torture on the deceased’s body. But the local unit of PUCL, with the support of a large number of democratic people foiled this attempt by organizing protest action, demanding re-postmortem at Ranchi Medical College and registration of FIR. Santosh Yadav as a leading member of the PUCL played a very active role in this movement. Ultimately the police was forced to get re-postmortem done at Ranchi Medical College, in which 12 external injuries were found on the deceased’s body as tell-tale signs of torture by the police. An FIR was also registered in the case. Subsequently, a two-member high powered committee, appointed by Jharkhand Govt, confirmed the killing of Rajinder Yadav in police custody by inflicting torture, and attempt to destroy evidence through complicity of doctors, indicting SP Jatin Narwal and other police officials and the doctors.

          Similarly in another case, the trigger happy Jharkhand Police fired upon a four-wheeler in Sultani Ghati area, in Palamau District, on 16^th January 2012, killing its driver Davinder Yadav and injuring its owner Ajit Singh. The local unit of the PUCL demanded registration of criminal case against the police officials responsible for it and struggled for it, facing stiff opposition & threats from the police and a vigilante group known as TPC (Tritiye Prastuti Committee). Fearing for their lives and liberty, Santosh Yadav and some other activists, who played leading role in this agitation filed petitions in local courts as well as in Jharkhand High Court.

                        It has been the modus operendi of Jharkhand, Bihar and the police forces of other States, where Operation Green Hunt is underway, to register cases of false encounters, wherein along with some known Maoists,  an unspecified number of unknown persons are shown to have been involved. Afterwards, anyone inimical to the police, ruling party politicians or the vigilante groups is implicated, in such cases. We fear that Jharkhand Police may falsely implicate Santosh Yadav also in more such cases.

                      We call upon the Chief Ministers of Bihar & Jharkhand to unconditionally release Santosh Yadav by dropping all criminal proceedings against him and roll-back the policy of letting loose repression on the people struggling to protect their lives and livelihood, which are being threatened by the anti-people and anti-national economic policies of the rulers. The Govt must stop killing of the people in false encounters and custodial torture; false implication in criminal cases; attacks on defenders of democratic rights and propping up vigilante armed groups under various names. 

SIGNATORIES

1. Dr. Parminder Singh, Convener, Democratic Front Against Operation Green Hunt, Punjab, Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar.
2. Prof. A.K.Maleri  Ludhiana
3. Advocate Balwant Singh Dhillon, President Lawyers for Human Rights & Justice, Bathinda
4. Jagmel Singh, General Secretary, Lok Morcha Punjab, Bathinda
5. Gurdial Singh Bhangal, President, Lok Morcha, Punjab
6. Kanwaljeet Khanna, President, Inqlabi Kender, Punjab
7. Balwant Makhu, President Lok Sangram Manch Punjab
8. Advocate N.K.Jeet, Bathinda
9. Advocate Sudeep Singh, Bathinda
10. Advocate Rajneesh K. Rana, Bathinda
11. Amolak Singh, President Lok Sabhyachar Manch, Punjab
12. Attarjeet Singh, Story writer, Bathinda
13. Karora Singh Ex-Circle President, Technical Services Union (PSEB) Bathinda

‘Free Dr Binayak Sen, Now!’

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.

Courtesy : HARD NEWS Dated 24.12.2010

THE HINDU

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

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.

Prabhakar Sinha (President) Pushkar Raj (General Secretary) Mahi Pal Singh (National Secretary) Kavita Srivastava (National Secretary)

LOK MORCHA PUNJAB CONDEMNS DETENTION OF Sh. HIMANSHU BY CHHATTISGARH POLICE

Lok Morcha Punjab strongly condemns the detention of Sh. Himanshu of the Vanvasi Chetna Asharam (VCA) Dantewada. This arrest and the earlier intimidatory steps taken by the Chhattisgarh Govt, clearly show its anti-people, fascist & repressive character. The rulers of Chhattisgarh & India are mainly interested in aiding & abetting the plunder of rich natural resources of Chhattisgarh by imperialist MNCs and their Indian agents. We join you in demanding immediate & unconditional release of Sh. Himanshu & all such other social and political activists, implementation of the SC orders of rehabilitation of internally displaced people, stopping of all operations like green hunt and others that are responsible for human rights violations and
letting activists and media to freely move in the areas.

AMOLAK SINGH
General Secretary
N.K.JEET Advocate
President,
LOK MORCHA PUNJAB
E-Mail: nkjeetbti@gmail.com
Website: lokmorcha.blogspot.com
Blog: Muktimarg