Sahba Husain relinquished her freedom to spend nearly two years in house arrest in a makeshift room with her partner of 30 years.
What makes a 71-year-old woman relinquish her freedom, in the city that has been home for 54 years, and voluntarily move into confinement?
“One date can overturn your life,” Sahba Husain chuckles over a phone call with me. For her, that date is August 28, 2018, when the house she shared with her partner Gautam Navlakha in Delhi was raided. Read more
The draconian UAPA has drawn criticism from several Supreme Court judges. However, it continues to be used against prominent writers, activists and journalists.
A celebrated Booker Prize-winning author and human rights activist, Arundhati Roy became the latest target of India’s draconian law – Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, after Delhi’s Lieutenant General approved her prosecution on a complaint lodged 14 years ago. The approval comes days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his BJP-led NDA came to power for the third time. Human rights organisations have accused the government of misusing the law to silence critics.
Since 2014, at least 6,900 UAPA cases have been lodged until 2020, according to NCRB data. Read more
To mark six years of the arbitrary arrests and imprisonment of political dissidents in the Bhima Koregaon case, The Polis Project is publishing a series of writings by the BK-16, and their families, friends and partners. By describing various aspects of the past six years, the series offers a glimpse into the BK-16’s lives inside prison, as well as the struggles of their loved ones outside. Each piece in the series is complemented by Arun Ferreira’s striking and evocative artwork.
Credits: Drawing by Arun Ferreira / The Polis Project
BK-16 PRISON DIARIES: STORIES OF LOVE, MURDER AND CHILD MARRIAGE FROM SHOMA SEN’S YEARS IN PRISONS
16/06/2024
The Polis Project / by Shoma Sen
While we were in jail, Himanta Biswa Sarma, the chief minister of Assam, initiated a campaign (read: crackdown) against child marriage. Instead of formulating programmes to educate the community and facilitate social reforms, he used law enforcement to viciously subjugate the poor, minorities and rural residents, to superimpose modernism through fear and repression.
A large number of women living in prison had been married off between the ages of 12 and 14, and were being held for different crimes, from theft and murder to trafficking drugs and children. Read more
The national media coverage of the violence at Bhima Koregaon enhanced the historical significance of the place. Until 2018, Bhima Koregaon was not embedded in the popular consciousness outside Maharashtra.
Below is an excerpt from the recent book of Ajaz Ashraf titled Bhima Koregaon: Challenging Caste. Publisher: AuthorsUpFront.
The story you are about to read does not begin with the beginning. It does not because it is difficult to identify precisely where and when the story began. The beginning is buried deep inside events that occurred centuries ago, recorded or remembered and passed down orally over generations, in what is now the state of Maharashtra in western India. Read more
Bhima Koregaon: Challenging Caste. Brahminism’s wrath against dreamers of equality
Author: Ajaz Ashraf
Publisher: AuthorsUpFront
Publishing Date: June 2024
Binding: Paperback
Language: English
Pages: 496 Read more/order
BK-16 PRISON DIARIES: ARUN FERREIRA ON THE FARCE AND TRAGEDY OF THE PANDEMIC IN PRISON
To mark six years of the arbitrary arrests and imprisonment of political dissidents in the Bhima Koregaon case, The Polis Project is publishing a series of writings by the BK-16, and their families, friends and partners. By describing various aspects of the past six years, the series offers a glimpse into the BK-16’s lives inside prison, as well as the struggles of their loved ones outside. Each piece in the series is complemented by Arun Ferreira’s striking and evocative artwork.
Credits: Drawing by Arun Ferreira / The Polis Project
BK-16 PRISON DIARIES: ARUN FERREIRA ON THE FARCE AND TRAGEDY OF THE PANDEMIC IN PRISON
14/06/2024
THE POLIS PROJECT / ARUN FERREIRA
The first wave of COVID-19 took us all by surprise, universally. We were caught unawares, and our response was clumsy and faltered, often searching for solutions that now appear ridiculous. It was no different in prison, but what made things even worse was the compounded consequences of the farcical implementation of sincere solutions, and the sincere implementation of farcical solutions. Prison authorities did not display any intention of adequately dealing with the pandemic, but were eager to present a façade of an efficient administrative response on official records with a miniscule number of COVID-19 cases. Read more
To mark six years of the arbitrary arrests and imprisonment of political dissidents in the Bhima Koregaon case, The Polis Project is publishing a series of writings by the BK-16, and their families, friends and partners. By describing various aspects of the past six years, the series offers a glimpse into the BK-16’s lives inside prison, as well as the struggles of their loved ones outside. Each piece in the series is complemented by Arun Ferreira’s striking and evocative artwork.
Credits: Drawing by Arun Ferreira / The Polis Project
BK-16 PRISON DIARIES: VERNON GONSALVES ON THE STRUGGLE TO READ AND WRITE BEHIND BARS
14/06/2024
THE POLIS PROJECT / VERNON GONSALVES
A prison peer-view that I cherish is a drawing by the artist Arun Ferreira, when we were fellow inmates of Nagpur Central Prison in 2011. He shows me sitting at the gate of my cell, writing-pad in hand, and writing—or rather, trying to write. It’s aptly titled, “Some Sophisticated Self-Deception.”
Perhaps I like it because it’s an image that I, like many other political prisoners, wanted as a prison self-image—someone who’s not wasting away his years behind bars. Someone who has some output, even if “only” intellectual output. Read more
INTRODUCING THE BK-16 PRISON DIARIES SERIES
13/06/2024
THE POLIS PROJECT / By THE POLIS PROJECT
On 1 January 1818, a small British battalion mainly comprising Dalit soldiers from the oppressed Mahar caste defeated an army of dominant-caste Peshwas at Koregaon. The battle gained a legendary status, representing a victory not just in Bhima Koregaon, but against caste injustices perpetrated by the Peshwas. The Mahar community celebrates the anniversary as a festival called “Valour Day,” and many make an annual pilgrimage to an obelisk at the site that memorialises the battle. Read more
Supreme Court seeks NIA’s stand on activist Mahesh Raut plea seeking interim bail
Mahesh Raut Approaches Supreme Court For Interim Bail To Attend Ceremonies Related To Grandmother’s Funeral
14/06/2024
Live Law / by Anmol Kaur Bawa
Bhima Koregaon case accused Mahesh Raut has approached the Supreme Court to seek interim bail for attending the ceremonies relating to the last rites of his grandmother.
The vacation bench of Justices PV Sanjay Kumar and AG Masih which was hearing the matter has adjourned the case till 21st June at the request of the National Investigating Agency (NIA). Read more
Supreme Court seeks NIA’s stand on activist Mahesh Raut plea seeking interim bail
14/06/2024
The Telegraph / by pti
A vacation bench of Justices Sanjay Kumar and Augustine George Masih posted the matter for hearing on June 21
The Supreme Court on Friday asked the National Investigation Agency (NIA) to take instructions on a plea filed by activist Mahesh Raut, an accused in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case, seeking interim bail to attend rituals following the death of his grandmother. Read more
SC to hear plea of activist seeking interim bail on June 21
15/04/2024
Legal News / by ANI
The Supreme Court on Friday said it would hear on June 21 a plea filed by activist Mahesh Raut, an accused in the Bhima-Koregaon case, seeking interim bail to attend rituals following the death of his grandmother. Read more
From Kashmir to Pune, here are some of the most high-profile names in India’s prisons for whom the criminal justice process has been made the punishment
From the barrage of detainees from the CAA-NRC protests to the infamous Bhima Koregaon arrests, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s time in office has been marked by a number of ‘political prisoners’ who remain indefinitely behind bars, with their trials still pending. Read more
Charging a person for the special security arrangements made during the period of house arrest on medical grounds violates the fundamental principle of ‘equality before law’
Everyone who values democracy and human rights had much to cheer about last month when the Supreme Court ordered the release of Prabir Purkayastha from jail and also gave bail to Gautam Navlakha. For me, however, this joy was mixed with total bewilderment at an accompanying development; namely, the apex court asking Navlakha to pay Rs 20 lakh to the State to cover the expenses incurred on his security during the preceding months when he was in house arrest on medical grounds. Read more
While forming the government, Modi may do whatever it takes, but thereafter he will recoil back to his fascist persona with a vengeance.
… Most commentators expect Modi 3.0 to be a tamed affair which may not last a full term. I do not agree. While forming the government, he may do whatever it takes, but thereafter he will recoil back to his fascist persona with a vengeance, like a wounded tigress. He will do more of what he knew and did with added fervour of vendetta. For instance, Muslims and Dalits concertedly voted against the BJP, and he will not leave them unpunished. There will be more incarcerations of dissenters (“urban Naxals”), and more raids on and arrests of political opponents by the central agencies under the guise of punishing corruption. Read more
