Solidarity – Page 70 – free them all

CASR: Release Varavara Rao immediately! Demand the release of all political prisoners!

16/07/2020 Rani

By Campaign Against State Repression

The Campaign Against State Repression (CASR) demands the immediate release of the revolutionary poet Varavara Rao who has tested positive for COVID-19. As per information received by family members, Varavara Rao’s health has rapidly deteriorated over the last couple of weeks. This is also evidenced by his weakening physical state, incoherent speech and inability to independently perform daily or bodily functions. After persistent efforts of family members in highlighting his health condition, the jail authorities, who had denied these concerns, were compelled to shift Varavara Rao to JJ Hospital in Mumbai on July 13th. However, his health further worsened as hospital authorities failed to care for him. They even forcibly sent away his family for raising concerns about him being abandoned on a dirty and unsanitary stretcher. Today, he has tested positive for COVID-19 and has been shifted to Saint George Hospital, Mumbai.
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Mumbai Rises: Life of Prisoners put at risk during pandemic! Release All Political Prisoners!

16/07/2020 Rani

By Mumbai Rises To Save Democracy

Life of Prisoners put at risk during pandemic !
VARAVARA RAO tests positive for Covid 19!
Demand Immediate Release of All Political Prisoners!
STOP IMPRISONING DURING PANDEMIC!

People’s Poet Varavara Rao has been shifted to the Saint George Hospital today after he tested positive for Coronavirus. The 80 year old poet has been jailed along with 10 others activists in a false case post the attacks at Bhima Koregaon in 2018. …

More than 500 appeal CM Uddhav Thackeray to release BK accused

16/07/2020 Rani

Karctivist.org/ by Kractivist

Mumbai, July 16, 2020 – More than 500 individuals including activists academics, lawyers and Students endorsed petition to Chief Minister Maharashtra Uddhav Bal Thackeray demanding interim bail amidst Covid 19 Pandemic for the Bhima Koregaon 11.
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Workers Demand: Free Sudha Bharadwaj!

Chhattisgarh, July 14

Revamped Shakti Bhatt prize honours activists Anand Teltumbde and Gautam Navlakha

16/07/2020 Rani

The Indian Express / by Lifestyle Desk

Starting this year, the Shakti Bhatt First Book Prize now known as the Shakti Bhatt Prize, will honour an author’s body of work rather than their first book, as was hitherto practiced. This year’s honours go to Anand Teltumbde, scholar, activist and writer of Khairlanji: A Strange and Bitter Crop and Republic of Caste along with Gautam Navlakha, an activist, journalist and writer of Days and Nights in the Heartland of Rebellion.
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When the State Fears a Poet: Varsha speaks up for her uncle

15/07/2020 Rani

Boston Review / by Varsha Gandikota-Nellutla

On Saturday, I checked my phone and saw that we’d heard from my uncle, currently a political prisoner in India. “I’m alright,” he said. But he wasn’t alright. His voice was weak and feeble, and his words, disjointed, slipped into Hindi instead of his beloved Telugu. For over six decades, Varavara Rao, the revolutionary poet, captivated generations with his critical poetry and prose. That he was anything less than articulate, let alone incoherent, was a gut punch. The goal of Narendra Modi’s administration has been to silence those like my uncle. Had they succeeded?
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Free Varavara Rao – Release All Political Prisoners

15/07/2020 Rani

By Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Liberation

… what Varavara Rao and other political prisoners need is more than basic humanitarian care. They need justice.
They have been imprisoned on the ridiculous charge of “conspiring to kill the Prime Minister.” The only evidence against them is their attempts to build an anti-fascist movement in India. Varavara Rao, Gautam Navlakha, Anand Teltumbde, Shoma Sen, Sudha Bharadwaj, Surendra Gadling, Mahesh Raut, Arun Ferreira, Vernon Gonsalves, Sudhir Dhawale and Rona Wilson are not “conspirators”. Each of them has worn their politics on their sleeves, speaking, writing, and working for the rights and assertion of the oppressed in India.
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Cards and letters for jailed India scholar Anand Teltumbde as he turns 70 / Zoom talk 7pm

15/07/2020 Rani

Dalit artist Siddhesh Gautam’s drawing of Prof Teltumbde in jail

BBC / by BBC

Prominent Indian scholar and human rights defender Anand Teltumbde has turned 70 in a Mumbai prison amid growing calls for his release, writes the BBC’s Geeta Pandey in Delhi.
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‘YOUR IDEAS HAVE SPREAD LIKE WILDFIRE’: A LETTER TO DR ANAND TELTUMBDE ON HIS BIRTHDAY

The Wire / by Suraj Yengde, Balmurli Natrajan, Meena Kandasamy, Sangeeta Kamat and Biju Mathew

The din of darkness sprawls, the night sky devours and us – those who love you yearn for the patient past to be with us and skip the present. There is a silence in the lover’s island while the canon of flames has died in a fascist land.
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Upcoming

@surajyengde & @meenakandasamy talk about Anand Teltumbde´s work, its significance, why is he being targeted?
July 15, 2020
7pm IST

Click to enlarge

Young Poets Demand Immediate Release of People´s Poet Varavara Rao

14/07/2020 Rani

By Young Poets of the Nation

We call upon young fellow poets to stand up for Varavara Rao because of who we are able to stretch the reach of our imagination and ideas and write poetry.
#FreeVaravaraRao

Click to enlarge full statement

Alarming Reports of Attacks on Human Rights Defenders in India: UN

14/07/2020 Rani

UN / By Mary Lawlor United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights Defenders

I continue to receive alarming and regular news about Human Rights Defenders (HRDs) in India. The 79 year-old jailed Human Rights Defender Varavara Rao appears to have serious health concerns. He’s held in the overcrowded Taloja Prison in Mumbai.
We know that HRDs are at great risk in prisons, which are breeding grounds for the virus. His health is frail, and like all HRDs in jail he should be immeditaley released.
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In Solidarity with Varavara Rao: Statements & Visuals

13/07/2020 Rani

+++ Udpate: VV Rao has been moved to the JJ Hospital in Mumbai +++

Scroll.in / by Scroll Staff

The PUDR said that it had become a standard procedure for the NIA to refuse bail to the poet as he did not suffer from a life-threatening disease.
The People’s Union for Democratic Rights on Monday expressed shock at the deteriorating health condition of poet Varavara Rao, and called for him to immediately be released. Rao, an accused in the Elgar Parishad case, is lodged in Taloja jail in Mumbai and his family has accused the authorities of neglecting his condition.
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AN APPEAL FROM PEN INTERNATIONAL AND PEN DELHI

By Pen International and Pen Delhi

Poet Varavara Rao has been held in jail since 2018 and has been consistently denied bail. Varavara Rao is 81 years old. His health is deteriorating. He is old. He is frail. He is ill. When he speaks with his loved ones what he says does not make much sense. Those taking care of him are concerned. At a time when the COVID-19 pandemic is raging and the government has ordered the decongestion of jails to prevent the infection from spreading, there is an even greater risk to Varavara Rao’s health.
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Video: Statement by Meena Kandasamy

en | 2:18 min | 2020
Watch video

RELEASE ALL POLITICAL PRISONERS

By Communist Party of India (Marxist)

The Polit Bureau of the CPI(M) expresses grave concern over the deteriorating health condition of several jailed political and human rights activists. Some of them have been reported to have contracted Covid-19 in jail. The deplorable conditions in the overcrowded jails, which lack even basic facilities has contributed immensely to their deteriorating health condition. Many of them have co-morbidities and have been on medications since long.
Read full statement