GN Saibaba – free them all

Political prisoners part of broader dissent against state excesses / The Future of Social Activism

27/07/2021 Maya

Poster, July 2020

Political prisoners part of broader dissent against state excesses

27/07/2021

The Leaflet / by Achintya Anita Gurumurthy

It has been over 500 days since Khalid Saifi’s incarceration and 300 for Umar Khalid in the northeast Delhi riots cases and almost three weeks since the custodial demise of Father Stan Swamy in the Bhima-Koregaon case – all arrested under the dreaded Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, (UAPA) 1967. The arrests have put the spotlight back on the category of ‘political prisoners’, who are imprisoned for opposing the government via their actions or beliefs.
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State and the Future of Social Activism

27/07/2021

EPW / by Gopal Guru

The death of Father Stan Swamy and several others as the tragic outcome of the arrest and detention without fair trial brings into critical focus the approach that the state has been adopting towards understanding social activism. In the ethics of democratic practice and constitutional morality, such an official approach would be evaluated as indiscrete, if not arbitrary, in comprehending the nature of social activism.
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Rally for jailed Indian scholars held in Surrey, Canada

28/06/2021 Rani

Surrey, June 27

Countercurrents.org / by Countercurrents

Close to the birthday of George Orwell and the 46th anniversary of Emergency in the world’s so called largest democracy, activists came together in Surrey on Sunday, June 27, to raise their voices against the incarceration of thinkers by the Indian authorities.
Organized by Radical Desi publications, the rally was held right outside the Indian Visa and Passport Application Center. The participants carried placards with pictures of jailed scholars who are being detained under trumped up charges for merely questioning the power and standing up for the poor and marginalized.
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Crushing Dissent During India’s Lockdown

26/05/2021 Rani

Towards Freedom / by Rishabh Jain

“The very thought of him having to plead to jail authorities regarding a basic service like clean water to wash his swelled eye still gives me anxiety attacks,” says Jenny Rowena, wife of Hany Babu.
Babu, a 55-year-old Delhi University professor, is among many political prisoners who have been detained after having been charged under a draconian Indian law, the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA).
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Also read/watch: Repeal UAPA – Persecution by Prosecution. Three Day consultation by PUCL in January 2021

Telangana govt bans Revolutionary Writers Association, 15 other orgs

23/04/2021 Maya

Siasat / by Yunus Y Lasania

The Telangana government on Friday banned 16 organisations, including the Revolutionary Writers Association, known as Virasam, claiming that these are frontal bodies of the banned Communist Party of India (Maoist), and are engaged in “tactics” that “wage war against the state”. The order was passed by chief secretary Somesh Kumar, with effect from March 30 this year.
… The Government Order also clearly states that the organisations are also being banned for demanding the release of Prof. GN Sai Baba, Rona Wilson, and writer Vara Vara Rao (who is from Virasam), who are all currently in prison with regard to the Elgar Parishad case, on allegations of conspiring to kill Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
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Also read: Andhra govt, Centre ‘collude’ to repeat Bhima Koregaon type case against rights activists (Counterview, April 2021)

Guilty by association – A profile of Hany Babu

18/01/2021 Maya

Solidarity poster, Aug 28, 2020

The Polis Project / by The Polis Project and maraa

… Hany Babu Musaliyarveettil Tharayil, 54, is an associate professor of Linguistics in Delhi University (DU). He is also a linguist, an anti-caste scholar, and a social activist. His work as an activist has been largely related to the pro-reservation movement in Indian universities. He is the coordinator of the Alliance of Social Justice, a member of the Joint Action Front for Democratic Education and, until his arrest, he was leading the Defense Committee for GN Saibaba, a professor convicted for alleged links with the Maoist movement.
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Gadling in jail. Reason? As lawyer-activist he has been ‘unpleasant’ to India’s topcops

27/12/2020 Rani

Counterview / by Nilkantha Mandal, Sandeep Pandey, Kushagra Kumar

Surendra Gadling, now in jail in the Bhima-Koregoan violence case, is a human rights lawyer and Dalit rights activist based in Nagpur. He is known for taking up cases of extra-judicial killings, police excesses and atrocities against Dalits and Adivasis in Gadchiroli and Gondia districts of Maharashtra.
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The cost of voicing dissent: UAPA against G.N. Saibaba, Gautam Navlakha, Father Stan Swamy and others

26/12/2020

Countercurrents / by Kunal Pant

In 2016, a Supreme Court Judge asked the state of Maharashtra, “Do you want to extract a pound of flesh?” The statement was directed against the state for contesting the bail plea of Delhi University Professor G. N. Saibaba. Saibaba was arrested in 2014, a justification for which was to prevent him from committing what the police called “anti-national activities.”
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India’s 21st-century dungeons – Government is tardy with revealing jail data

14/12/2020 Maya

UCA News / by John Dayal

A little plastic hollow straw, much like the one you’d get with fresh tender coconut or cold drink at a roadside eatery, has gained much attention not just on the vagaries of the law of the land and its courts, but even more on the conditions in the prisons in India.
It took several weeks for 84-year-old Jesuit Father Stan Swamy–in prison as a mere suspect in a trumped-up conspiracy called the Bhima-Koregaon case–to get the plastic drinking straw, which he needs to take a sip of water or tea because his Parkinson’s disease afflicted hands can bare hold the cup. He is not yet an undertrial, and certainly not a convict.
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Scholars at Risk Report Details Bleak State of Academic Freedom in India

26/11/2020 Rani

The Wire / by The Wire Staff

The SAR urged authorities to repeal the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act “to ensure compliance with obligations under its constitution and international human rights law”.
Scholars at Risk (SAR), an international network of higher education institutions that aims to defend academic freedom, in its Free to Think 2020 report, has called on authorities in India to “ensure the autonomy and functioning of higher education institutions”… In India, the Free to Think 2020 report, the arrest of activists, including students and scholars, amidst nationwide lockdowns raised concerns that the government was “taking advantage of the crisis in order to crack down on dissent”.
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Hyderabad actvist asks NHRC to look into Varavara Rao’s case

21/10/2020 Rani

The New Indian Express / by Express News Service

He requested the commission to take steps to provide medical care to Saibaba.
Hyderabad: MA Satyanarayana Rao, a city-based activist, has approached the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), requesting it to look into the alleged human rights violations to jailed Delhi University professor GN Saibaba and revolutionary poet Varavara Rao. He requested the commission to take steps to provide medical care to Saibaba.
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NIA Claims Arrested Accused Were Attempting to Create a ‘Dalit Militia’

21/10/2020 Rani

NIA Claims Arrested Accused Were Attempting to Create a ‘Dalit Militia’

21/10/2020

The Wire / by Sukanya Shantha

The NIA chargesheet has sidelined the Pune police’s earlier claim that the accused were plotting to assassinate Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Mumbai: In the over 10,000-page chargesheet recently filed in the Elgar Parishad case, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) has stacked together statements by witnesses who have made claims ranging from arms training undertaken by a few arrested accused in the forests of central India to some trying to “reinvent Dalit militancy” in the country.
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Teltumbde brought Maoist literature, videos from abroad: NIA chargesheet

21/10/2020

The Indian Express / by Sadaf Modak

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has alleged in its chargesheet filed in the Elgar Parishad case that former IIT professor Anand Teltumbde attended international conferences “under the guise of… academic visits abroad” and brought back Maoist literature and videos on “ideology, tactics, weapons” to show members of the banned Communist Party of India (Maoist).
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CPI(M) gets Rs 3 crore a year from Maharashtra, MP & Chhattisgarh zone, says NIA chargesheet

21/10/2020

The Indian Express / by Sadaf Modak

The National Investigation Agency’s (NIA) 10,000-page chargesheet in the Elgaar Parishad case relies on witness statements to draw up details about the banned CPI (Maoist), including its means of funding, training and recruitment.
According to a witness, members of the organisation collect Rs 350 per bag of tendua leaves – containing 1,000 pouches – as tax.
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NIA chargesheet claims triangular links between Delhi student front, accused and CPI (Maoist)

21/10/2020

Free Press Journal / by Bhavna Uchil

The chargesheet filed by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in the Bhima Koregaon – Elgar Parishad case has claimed a “concrete triangular link between a student’s organization functioning in New Delhi, arrested accused and CPI (Maoist) operating from the deep forest”.
It states that the issues related with the student front at JNU DSU are highlighted with some of the communication made with Maoist.
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