Counterview / by Vidya Bhushan Rawat
It is deeply disturbing that 81-year-old poet Varavara Rao has been denied bail and has now been admitted to a hospital in Mumbai. Reports suggest that the prison in Taloja, Navi Mumbai, where he was lodged, has several Covid-19 patient. The family and friends of Varavara Rao have protested in Hyderabad, as they were not even allowed to visit him.
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Scroll.in / by Malini Subramaniam
The subcommittee also questioned India’s use of UAPA to silence activists such as Safoora Zargar, Khalid Saifi, Meeran Haider and Sharjeel Imam, among others.
The European Parliament Subcommittee on Human Rights has written to Union Home Minister Amit Shah expressing concern about the recent arrests of activists Anand Teltumbde and Gautam Navlakha by the National Investigative Agency, and urged India to immediately release all political prisoners in view of the coronavirus pandemic. The activists are accused in the Bhima Koregaon case.
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NDTV / by Nandini Sundar
The recent arrests of Jamia student Asif Iqbal Tanha and two JNU students, Devangana Kalita and Natasha Narwal, both activists with Pinjra Tod, shows that the union home ministry is convinced the ‘Bhima Koregaon model’ works and must be replicated.
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23/05/2020
Times Now News / by Muhammad Wajihulla
New Delhi: A group of activists led the charge against the state government over the recent arrests of students and activists by the Delhi Police. In an online press conference held on Thursday, the activists claimed that the Delhi riots, Bhima-Koregaon violence and Gujarat riots have a similar pattern – of silencing the voice of dissent and brutal repression by the state.
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en | 4:32 min | 2020
The COVID 19 Lockdown has exposed how the ruling regime considers repressing democratic voices as an ‘essential service’. UAPA and Sedition laws have been used to for a witch-hunt of those who stand by secular, progressive ideals. Peasant and working class organizers, democratic rights defenders, lawyers, journalists and others have also been arrested under these colonial-era laws.
Angela Davis, activist in prison abolition movement and anti-racism revolutionary, speaks in solidarity with those being targeted today under UAPA.
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The Leaflet / by Ujjaini Chatterji
The United Nations Office of Drugs and Crimes, the World Health Organization, and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights have taken note of the spread of Covid-19 in prisons and other closed settings. In this regard, they have issued a statement urging political leaders to undertake the necessary public health measures to counter and mitigate this threat.
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17/05/2020
The New Indian Express / by PTI
In a bid to decongest state jails due to coronavirus outbreak, the state prisons department has so far released over 7,200 prisoners across the state on either temporary bail or parole.
PUNE: Authorities in Maharashtra have released over 7,200 prisoners so far to check overcrowding in jails amid the coronavirus pandemic, officials said on Sunday.
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14/05/2020
Quartz India / by Manavi Kapur
Overcrowded Indian prisons have become hotbeds of coronavirus cases.
In March, India’s supreme court recognised this risk—total occupancy of India’s jails standing at 115% —and set down guidelines for releasing some prisoners on parole and bail.
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Counterview/ by Surabhi Agarwal, Sandeep Pandey, Shreekumar
At a time when there can be no mass mobilisations or street protests, and when so many people are distressed, anxious and distracted by the unprecedented challenges our country is facing due to the Covid-19 crisis, the government’s actions against activists, journalists, intellectuals and Muslims appear to be calculated and insidious.
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14/05/2020
National Herald / by Ashlin Mathew
Even as the Government claims to be waging a desperate war against the coronavirus and the lockdown has crippled the economy, draconian laws are being invoked to punish protestors and stifle dissent.
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The Print / by Maneesh Chhibber
Supreme Court’s move to let single judge benches hear bail pleas must not end up like govt pronouncements – good to read about but with little impact on citizens’ lives.
It took a pandemic of the scale of Covid-19 for India’s Supreme Court to finally decide that single-judge benches will hear special leave petitions, or SLPs, arising out of bail orders in cases where the maximum punishment is up to seven years.
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The Wire / by Seemi Pasha
How can a person who was found in possession of illegal arms during a riot be granted bail in a riots case when others from whom nothing was recovered are still behind bars?
New Delhi: Consider the case of two people arrested by the Delhi Police in connection with the Delhi riots of February 2020.
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The Wire / by The Wire Staff
Civil liberties activist Vernon Gonsalves is lodged at Taloja jail along with others arrested in the 2018 Elgar Parishad case.
Mumbai: In a strange turn of events, two policemen from Mumbai’s crime branch landed at civil rights activist and lawyer Susan Abraham’s residence in Andheri asking the whereabouts of her husband Vernon Gonsalves, who has been in jail since 2018. Gonsalves, who was arrested in August 2018 for his alleged involvement in the Elgar Parishad case, is currently lodged at Taloja central prison located in Thane district.
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The Indian Express / by Express News Service
“My son Sagar and I were shocked and disturbed at this uncalled for visit at a time when the risk of transmission of Covid-19 between police (frontline workers) and community members is very high,” the letter states.
Activist Vernon Gonsalves’ wife, advocate Susan Abraham, has written to the Mumbai Police commissioner and Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court stating that while her husband is lodged in Taloja jail in connection with the Elgaar Parishad case, police officers from the crime branch visited their home, making inquiries about his whereabouts. Gonsalves has been behind bars since August 2018.
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en | 3:06 min | 2020
Leaders of CPIML, CPI(M), CPI, AIFB, RSP, RJD, LJD and VCK have written a Joint Opposition Memorandum to the President of India demanding an end to the ongoing witch-hunt and release of all political prisoners in view of their enhanced health risk and to wage a united fight against Covid19.
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11 May 2020
Release all political prisoners-
Dissenting Voices
Activists of Peoples Movements
and Opposition leaders
End Overcrowding in India’s Jails
Read full statement below
