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Stand with Fr Stan Swamy / Solidarity Campaigns (pics)

Stand with Fr Stan Swamy / Solidarity Campaigns (pics)


By Jharkhand Janadhikar Mahasabha / @JharkhandJanad1 (Dec 12):
Rajesh Kachhap, @INCJharkhand MLA says that Stan Swamy’s arrest is an attack on freedom of expression by the dictatorial central govt. He demands Stan’s release and appeals to @HemantSorenJMM govt to write to the centre.

Silent protest launches campaign calling for release of Father Stan Swamy

10/12/2020

CSW / by CWS

A protest has been held today, International Human Rights Day, outside the High Commission of India in London, organised by the UK-based Jesuit Missions, to mark the launch of an international campaign calling for the immediate and unconditional release from prison of Father Stan Swamy.
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Stand with Father Stan

10/12/2020

By Jesuit Mission UK

This Human Rights Day falls on the 10 December, and Jesuit Missions is inviting you to take action to help free Fr Stan Swamy SJ from prison.
What you can do
We want to raise awareness about what has happened to Fr Stan Swamy. This can be done in two ways.
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Postcard campaign

10/12/2020

Click to enlarge

Who will Defend the Human Rights’ Defenders? Release Political Prisoners, Repeal UAPA

09/12/2020

Right to Food and Work Campaign, West Bengal

National Level Postcard Campaign Takes Off on Human Rights Day On 10th December, 2020, International Human Rights Day, a nation-wide post card campaign asking the Prime Minister to repeal the draconian Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) and to release all prisoners who have been incarcerated under this Act, is being inaugurated.

Read full statement / Click to enlarge
Organisers of Elgar Parishad say accused are denied basic human rights

Organisers of Elgar Parishad say accused are denied basic human rights

The Hindu / by Sonam Saigal

On Human Rights Day, retired judges say intellectuals have been implicated for speaking against the government.
It is close to three years that intellectuals, activists and lawyers were arrested in the Bhima Koregaon violence case. Retired judges, who organised the Elghar Parishad event, say, “All those accused in the case are not connected with it but they have been implicated because they have spoken against the government. They are denied basic human rights.”
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Human Rights Padyatra Demands Release of Sudha Bhardwaj and her Co-Accused (pics)

Human Rights Padyatra Demands Release of Sudha Bhardwaj and her Co-Accused (pics)

Click to enlarge pics

By PUCL-CG and CMM-MKS

People’s Union for Civil Liberties-Chhattisgarh & Chhattisgarh Mukti Morcha-Mazdoor Karyakarta Samiti had given the call to march in solidarity with Sudha Bharadwaj and other human rights activists on International Human Rights Day.
The yatra was planned from Bhilai Power House to the Chief Minister’s residence in Raipur to deliver a memorandum, demanding the release of Sudha Bharadwaj and her co-accused. But the padyatra was stopped by the police near Khursipar in Bhilai, violating the fundamental right of the citizens to protest peacefully.
They demanded:
Release Sudha Bharadwaj!
Release all Human Rights Activists!
Stop Human Rights Violations in Chhattisgarh!

Swiss parliamentarians and trade unionists formed a solidarity committee for BK16

Swiss parliamentarians and trade unionists formed a solidarity committee for BK16

By SOLIFONDS

Parliamentarians and trade unionists establish solidarity committee for arrested human rights activists, lawyers, intellectuals and cultural workers in India

Press Release Nov 30, 2020
Swiss parliamentarians and trade unionists have formed a solidarity committee for political prisoners in India. With this they protest against the criminalization of human rights activists and government critics in India and demand their release. They also call on the Indian government to ensure that they are released, that irregularities in the proceedings against the arrested persons are investigated and that rights of the prisoners are fully guaranteed. The committee was initiated by the Solidarity organization SOLIFONDS, which has been in contact with the well-known arrested lawyer and trade unionist Sudha Bharadwaj for years. …

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People’s organisations demand release of Bhima Koregaon case accused

People’s organisations demand release of Bhima Koregaon case accused

People’s organisations demand release of Bhima Koregaon case accused

29/11/2020

The Times of India / by Siva G

Andhra Pradesh: Various people’s organisations demanded the police to release the arrested people’s organisations leaders including adivasis, women, dalits and minorities unconditionally along with the 16 persons detained illegally in the Bhima Koregaon case.
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Tribal Rights Activist Among 67 Slapped With UAPA Over ‘Maoist Link’ Suspicion

29/11/2020

The Wire / by Gali Nagaraja

Driven to a frenzy over purported statements given by Maoist sympathisers, Andhra police have arrested several human rights activists from Andhra Pradesh and Haryana.
Hyderabad: Athram Suguna, a 38-year old school teacher of the Gond tribe from Telangana’s Fakrigutta in Adilabad district, has been caught in a cat-and-mouse game with no end in sight.
Suguna works as a school assistant in a zilla parishad high school at Utnoor. After a group of suspected Maoist sympathisers supposedly spilled the beans on a network of Maoists to the police, the latter have framed her in a case under the draconian and stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.
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Principles and norms laid down in the Constitution of India / Save Our Constitution

Principles and norms laid down in the Constitution of India / Save Our Constitution


Delhi, 2019

Is India governed by the principles and norms laid down in the Constitution of India

29/11/2020

The Leaflet / by Jacob Peenikaparambil

The Constitution of India was adopted more than two years after independence from British rule. It provided a common vision and set goals towards which both the government and people of India could strive as well as the foundational principles of governance of a nation.
Along with celebrations, this day is also for introspection for Indians. How far has the vision and goals of the constitution been realised? …
Dissent is demonised as anti-national by the government and the ruling party. The judiciary that is entrusted with the task of protecting the fundamental rights of the citizens is often shirking from its responsibilities.
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Save Our Constitution

29/11/2020

The Leaflet / by Cedric Prakash

In times when the Supreme Court is selectively granting relief for wide-scale violation of constitutional rights, it is important to save the constitution by saving the Article which embodied the heart and soul of the Constitution according to Dr Ambedkar i.e Art 32…
Fr Stan Swamy and fifteen others who are ‘allegedly’ involved in the Bhima-Koregaon conspiracy case are in jail- some of them languishing for more than two years now. Besides these, there are several others imprisoned under the UAPA, and were also charged and arrested on the archaic ‘sedition’ law and even on ‘contempt of court’.
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Release the Poet: NO BIAS! JUSTICE FOR ALL!

Release the Poet: NO BIAS! JUSTICE FOR ALL!

By Release the Poet Committee @ FB

Release the Poet Committee’s statement at Kolkata Press Club on 23rd Nov
“…If we look upon the flood of tweets and whatsapp texts, memes and mimics denouncing the highest seat of judiciary – the Supreme Court – in the last few months, we could clearly see that it was unprecedented in the history of India! People are openly getting judgmental and bitterly critical about the so called “temple of justice” discounting the risk that is ‘contempt of court’. The state should lend an ear to this alarm, which is, ACTUALLY, directed to them. …

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UAPA and the growing crisis of judicial credibility in India

UAPA and the growing crisis of judicial credibility in India

Observer Research Foundation / by Niranjan Sahoo & Jibran Khan

The Democracy Report 2020 by V-Dem Institute created quite a storm recently in India’s policy circles. The report claimed that the world’s largest democracy is on the verge of losing its status as a democracy. Noting India’s rapid slide into an autocracy, the Sweden-based report, which produces the most comprehensive analyses on the health of democracy across the world, cited trends of dramatic erosion of basic civil liberties, particularly media freedom and suppression of the freedoms of free speech and dissent as the key reasons for this major dip…
The last two years, in particular, have witnessed a sharp rise in the arrests of several prominent human rights defenders, civil society leaders, agitating leaders and even protesting students under the UAPA and sedition laws, including Sudha Bharadwaj, Vernon Gonsalves, Arun Ferreira, Varavara Rao, Anand Teltumde, Gautam Navlakha, and Arun Ferreira.
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A List of Activists, Scholars and Scribes Whose Personal Liberty Remains at Judiciary’s Mercy

A List of Activists, Scholars and Scribes Whose Personal Liberty Remains at Judiciary’s Mercy

A List of Activists, Scholars and Scribes Whose Personal Liberty Remains at Judiciary’s Mercy

13/11/2020

The Wire / by Ismat Ara and Sukanya Shantha

On September 7, following sustained interrogation at the National Investigation Agency’s office in Mumbai, two activists of the Kabir Kala Manch – Sagar Gorkhe and Ramesh Gaichor – were arrested for alleged connections to the 2018 Elgar Parishad case. Days later, another young cultural activist of the group, Jyoti Jagtap, was arrested too…
The Wire has put together a list of cases where activists and journalists arrested in the past years have struggled either in securing regular hearings, or in having their basic human rights protected, or both. Their situations put the Supreme Court’s assertion on “personal liberty” during Goswami’s bail hearing in harsh perspective.
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Stan Swamy vs Arnab Goswami: Are activists fighting a losing battle? Whither justice?

14/11/2020

Counterview / by Fr Sunil Macwan SJ

It is time one raised pertinent questions over the courts denying bail to Fr Stan Swamy, who was arrested under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), and granting it to Arnab Goswami, editor-in-chief of the Republic TV, arrested under the charge of abetting suicide of Avay Naik, who ended his life in 2018. It is travesty of justice that a human rights activist is not only denied bail but is also made to wait for weeks to hear a response to his legitimate request for a straw to drink water, while Arnab Goswami walks free.
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