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Indian Democracy Is Facing an Existential Crisis: Progressive Writers’ Association / Repackaged Laws

10/09/2023 Asha

‘Indian Democracy Is Facing an Existential Crisis’: Progressive Writers’ Association

09/09/2023

The Wire / by The Wire Staff | Progressive Writers’ Association

“It is the duty of literature to stand for the downtrodden, the oppressed, the underprivileged, whether an individual or a group.”
Between August 20 and 22, the Progressive Writers’ Association held its 18th annual conference in Jabalpur. At the end of the conference, the PWA adopted a declaration in which it discussed the threats to democracy, equality and secularism in India – ideals with the Association see themselves as guardians of.
„… Increasing discrimination and atrocities on women, tribals and Dalits is the natural consequence of the proud superiority of the Manuwadi ideology of majoritarianism. This text can be read from Una and Hathras to Bhima Koregaon…“
Read the full declaration

Repackaged Laws for Decolonization Game

10/09/2023

News Click / by Suhit K Sen

Official anti-colonial rhetoric lacks substance and creates the basis for a more authoritarian order.
On the eve of the 77th Independence Day this year, Union Home Minister Amit Shah tabled in the Lok Sabha Bills to amend three colonial-era codes on which the criminal justice system rests, spinning this as a belated blow in favour of decolonisation.
… Though the presumption of innocence remains at the heart of the criminal justice system, its perversions remain—not created by the current regime but relentlessly misused by it.
Read more

The many ideas behind the birth of poetry that floats like a butterfly; and stings like a bee

07/09/2023

Hindustan Times / by Ramu Ramanathan

The turning point of Telugu literary history is 3 and 4 July of 1970. Poets who were invited to speak at the seminar/ poets who were not invited to the seminar/ poets who were going to be felicitated/ poets who were expelled/ poets who were going to boycott/ poets who were to be a member of the executive committee/ poets of all ideologies and -isms
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What is Section 207 CrPC, an essential piece of the Bhima Koregaon case puzzle?

31/08/2023 Asha

The Leaflet / by Sarah Thanawala

What is the law embedded in Section 207 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 and why does it keep getting invoked in the Elgar Parishad–Bhima Koregaon case?
Sevaral accused in the Elgar Parishad–Bhima Koregaon case have claimed that the National Investigation Agency (NIA) has inordinately delayed giving them access to copies of important evidence in the case.
The evidence exists in the form of cloned copies of electronic material purportedly recovered from the accused.
Read more

Also Read:
● NIA gets more time to reply to plea for furnishing copies of evidence to the accused (The Leaflet / July 2023)
● Why Courts Are Ignoring Concerns Of Planted Evidence In The Bhima-Koregaon Prosecution (article14 / Jan 2023)
● Incriminating evidence planted in computers: The Trojan solved the Bhima Koregaon case! (Anchored Narratives / Jan 2023)
● Prison-rights activist Rona Wilson’s hard disk contained malware that allowed remote access (The Caravan / March 2020)

Prakash Ambedkar deposes before Koregaon Bhima panel

31/08/2023 Asha

The Indian Express / by Chandan Haygunde

In his affidavit filed before the commission on July 24, Ambedkar had sought an inquiry into the alleged intelligence failure regarding the Koregaon Bhima violence
Dalit leader and president of the Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) Prakash Ambedkar deposed as a witness before the Koregaon Bhima Commission of Inquiry on Wednesday.
Read more

Also Read:
● Bhima Koregaon Violence: Four Different Theories, but No Justice in Sight (The Wire / Jan 2022)
● India’s Hindu Nationalist Project Relies on Brutal Repression (Jacobinmag / April 2021)
● Saffron Conspiracy in Bhima Koregaon? – Fact finding report by Rashtra Seva Dal unearths insidious scheme to target Dalits (CJP / Jan 2018)

Koregaon Bhima Commission: Cross examination of IPS officer Nangare Patil concludes

28/08/2023 Asha

Imprisoned Voices. Booklet.

The Indian Express by Chandan Haygunde

During cross-examination by Jamadar, Nangare Patil said he had not visited the Jaystambh prior to January 1, 2018. As per Nangare Patil’s affidavit, there were inputs that some “Dalit Sanghatna” wanted to demolish Jamadar’s house located adjacent to the Jaystambh on January 1, 2018.
The cross-examination of Indian Police Service (IPS) officer Vishwas Nangare Patil, who appeared before the Koregaon Bhima Commission of Inquiry as a witness, concluded Saturday.
Read more

Also Read:
● Top Investigating Officer Admits Elgar Parishad Event ‘Had No Role’ in Bhima Koregaon Violence (The Wire / Dec 27, 2022)
● Witness Before Probe Panel Accuses Sambhaji Bhide & Milind Ekbote Of Instigating Bhima Koregaon Riots (Live Law / Oct 2021)
● Let’s Remember the Lesson of Bhima Koregaon: Down with the New Peshwai (Sanhati│ by Sudhir Dhawale │ March 2018)
● Why peoples’ coalitions are uniting against Hindutva — the ‘new Peshwai’ (Dailyo.in │ by Arun Ferreira and Vernon Gonsalves │ Jan 30, 2018)

The remedy of bail: From securing liberty to ‘digital jail’

21/08/2023 Asha

The Leaflet / by Ibad Mushtaq and Akansksha Bishtibad

In the pursuit of justice, the delicate balance between individual rights and societal interests often comes under scrutiny. In the case of Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira, their bail conditions, including the demanding round-the-clock location monitoring, have ignited a crucial debate that such stringent surveillance not only infringes upon their fundamental rights to life, liberty and dignity, but also undermines the essence of bail itself— to restore freedom.
Read more

Also read:
● NIA in a quandary as bail condition for mobile phone tethering turns out to be a tug (The Leaflet / Aug 2023)
● PUDR welcomes the release on bail of Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira today, but protests onerous bail conditions (PUDR / Aug 5, 2023)

Can Fr Stan Swamy’s PIL be the blueprint for justice to thousands of undertrials lodged under UAPA?

18/08/2023 Asha

The Leaflet / by Sarah Thanawala

Can the judgment which granted bail to Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira form the basis for implementation of the same principles for granting bail to other accused in the Bhima Koregaon–Elgar Parishad case as well as to the other 500 detenues in Jharkhand who are still at the pre- or post-trial stage?
… A public interest litigation (PIL) filed by the late Father Stan Swamy in 2017 in the Jharkhand High Court may serve as a path in the direction of ending incarceration of the disturbingly large number of those held in custody without a trial.
Read more

Also watch/read:
● Video: Vernon v. State of Maharashtra: A Breakthrough in Bail Jurisprudence under the UAPA? (PUCL India / Aug 2023)
● Even after Stan Swamy’s death, the fight to get justice for Jharkhand undertrials is still alive (Scroll.in / Dec 2021)
● In Jharkhand, Scheduled Tribes Still Battle Flimsy Criminal Cases Filed With Little Evidence (IndiaSpend / Oct 2021)
● Public interest litigation filed by Stan Swamy and Xavier Soreng in 2017 (CJP / 2017)
● A study of Undertrials in Jharkhand (Sanhati / by Bagaicha Research Team / Feb 2016)

Probe the role of right-wing activists in Bhima Koregaon violence: Prakash Ambedkar

27/07/2023 Asha

Probe the role of orthodox Hindu bodies, their agents in govt in Bhima Koregaon violence: Prakash Ambedkar

27/07/2023

Hindustan Times / by HT Correspondent

Ambedkar filed an affidavit on Monday, July 24, before the commission of inquiry set up to investigate the violent incidents of January 1 and January 3, 2018, a day after the Elgar Parishad was organised in Pune’s Shaniwarwada.
Nearly five years after the Bhima Koregaon violence in which one person was killed and several others were injured, Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) chief Prakash Ambedkar called for an investigation to determine the role of orthodox Hindu bodies and their agents in administration to fuel the caste-based violence.
Read more

Prakash Ambedkar Files Affidavit After 5 Years

26/07/2023

Rediff.com / by Jyoti Punwani

Either this affidavit was prepared a long time back, or, Ambedkar has not been following the Commission’s hearings.
He was the main political leader to be associated with the Elgar Parishad, held in Pune’s historic Shaniwarwada on December 31, 2017, on the eve of the 200th anniversary of the historic battle of Bhima Koregaon.
The next day, after violence broke out near Bhima Koregaon on January 1, 2018, it was he who led the call for a state-wide protest bandh on January 3, which was heeded by all Dalit groups.
Yet, it took Prakash Ambedkar five years to file his affidavit before the commission of inquiry set up to investigate the violent incidents of January 1 and January 3, 2018.
Read more

VBA chief Prakash Ambedkar raises issue of ‘intelligence failure’ in affidavit before Koregaon-Bhima Commission

25/07/2023

The Indian Express / by Express News Service

Speaking to the media, Prakash Ambedkar said an inquiry should be done to find the level at which intelligence failure had happened so that the “loopholes” are known.
Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) chief Prakash Ambedkar called for an investigation to determine if the director general (DG) of the intelligence department had any prior information about untoward incidents happening in the Koregaon-Bhima area of Pune on January 1, 2018.
Prakash Ambedkar made this suggestion Monday in his affidavit filed before the Koregaon Bhima Commission of Inquiry in Pune.
Read more

Also Read:
● Top Investigating Officer Admits Elgar Parishad Event ‘Had No Role’ in Bhima Koregaon Violence (The Wire / Dec 27, 2022)
● India’s Hindu Nationalist Project Relies on Brutal Repression (Jacobinmag / April 2021)
● Saffron Conspiracy in Bhima Koregaon? – Fact finding report by Rashtra Seva Dal unearths insidious scheme to target Dalits (CJP / Jan 2018)

When reading books is criminalised: Examining UAPA, sedition cases in India

25/07/2023 Asha

The News Minute / by Prajwal Bhat, edited by Vidya Sigamany

Among other things, books read by students and activists are increasingly part of chargesheets in sedition and terror cases.
In Franz Kafka’s novel The Trial, the protagonist is prosecuted by an unknown authority that drags him through opaque legal proceedings where the nature of his crime is not revealed, to him or the reader. Such legal bureaucracies that are seemingly far-fetched are not too dissimilar to the trials of students, activists, and academics in India who are charged with sedition or under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA).
Perhaps the account that is most reminiscent of Kafka’s novel is Sagar Abraham-Gonsalves describing the police ransacking their home and confiscating books, computers, and hard drives before arresting Sagar’s father, activist Vernon Gonsalves, in connection with the Bhima Koregaon case.
Read more

Also read:

● Report: UAPA – CRIMINALISING DISSENT AND STATE TERROR (PUCL / Sep 2022)
Download report
● Will SC’s Sedition Order Mean Relief for Delhi Riots, Bhima Koregaon Accused? (The Quint / May 2022)
● Explainer: How the Sedition Law Has Been Used in the Modi Era (The Wire / Mai 2022)

Telangana turns into experimental theatre to misuse suppressive laws: CASR meet

24/07/2023 Asha

Counterview / by Our Representative

Speakers at a media conference, organised by the civil rights network Campaign Against State Repression (CASR), even as discussing “suppression of democratic voices” using suppressive laws in the light of the Tadwai case, where 152 activists of Andhra-Telangana were named under the anti-terror Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), have demanded repeal of the “draconian” law.
Read more

Also read:
● Blatant use of UAPA by Telangana Police to suppress dissenting voices (Countercurrents / June 2023)
● Telangana Govt to ‘Drop’ UAPA Case Against Prof Haragopal, Sudha Bharadwaj, 150 Others (The Wire / June 2023)
● The Govt is out to silence Dissenters through Arrests: Justice Hosbet Suresh (Sabrangindia / Oct 2018)

Will India care for human rights by releasing undertrial activists ahead of G20 summit?

21/07/2023 Asha

Counterview / by Bharat Dogra

India has a very rich tradition of opposing wrongly arrested persons, going back to the days of the freedom movement…
Hence, ahead of the Independence Day, it would be a much appreciated gesture on the part of the government if it releases several dissenting activists, including distinguished scholars and lawyers, who are widely believed to have been wrongfully arrested or implicated in wrong cases. To give one often discussed example of what is widely believed to be a case of wrongful arrests, we may mention here the Elgar Parishad case.
Read more

Also read:
● The Burgeoning Share of Undertrial Prisoners in India’s Jails (The Wire / Oct 2022)
● Punished without trial: How India’s political prisoners are being denied basic rights in jail (Scroll.in / Aug 2022)
● Even after Stan Swamy’s death, the fight to get justice for Jharkhand undertrials is still alive (Scroll.in / Dec 2021)