tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23867011006820307942024-02-08T08:05:06.975+05:30RightSpeaksRandom musings and observations about the state of human rights and human rights laws, democracy, justice, secularism, peace and, off course, the life and all its paraphernalia with particular reference to Barak valley.RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.comBlogger126125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-73251496787293930242020-05-06T21:20:00.000+05:302020-05-06T21:20:23.002+05:30CoViD 19: A case for releasing inmates of Assam detention camps<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<em style="color: var(--color-text); font-size: 16px;">All the six detention centers meant for declared foreign nationals in the northeastern state of India are inside congested prisons with no concept of social distancing. Detainees have hardly any rights and no waged work or parole. They must be released in the process of decongestion of prisons. </em></div>
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<span style="color: var(--color-text);">By </span><strong style="color: var(--color-text);">Arijit Sen </strong></div>
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<article class="entry author-varya post-4927 post type-post status-publish format-standard has-post-thumbnail category-essay tag-assam tag-covid19 tag-detention tag-detention-center" id="post-4927" style="line-height: 1.4em; margin: 0px;"><div class="entry-content">
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<img alt="" class="size-full wp-image-4928" height="900" src="https://thepolisproject.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Detention-Centre-Women-Priya-Kuriyan.jpg" style="max-width: 100%; padding: 0px;" width="2004" /></div>
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<em>Illustration by Priya Kuriyan</em></div>
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Attempts are on across India to <a href="https://www.business-standard.com/article/current-affairs/india-gears-up-for-rapid-virus-testing-as-rising-hotspots-ring-alarm-bells-120040201670_1.html" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">try </a>and <a href="https://time.com/5812394/india-coronavirus-lockdown-modi/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">prevent</a> the spread of COVID-19 pandemic. There’s a lockdown in place. Physical distancing, a luxury for many, is imperative, and so is personal hygiene. In this fight, <a href="https://www.thequint.com/videos/lakhs-of-indian-labourers-are-walking-home-fear-of-coronavirus" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">poor migrants</a> and daily wage laborers have been <a href="https://www.freepressjournal.in/amp/story/india%2Fwho-are-you-trying-to-kill-coronavirus-or-humans-video-of-up-authorities-spraying-chemical-solution-on-migrants-goes-viral-twitter-reacts?fbclid=IwAR1JpCKdjZI2z9pFnGzT7T-0a56iIlFRMCHpgIuGl1WrNWcoQ7YongbBXqA#aoh=15855622310093&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&amp_tf=From%20%251%24s" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">dehumanized</a>. Treated with indignity, they have been stranded without work, money, food or a roof above their heads, left to fend for themselves. The <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/03/27/india-covid-19-lockdown-puts-poor-risk" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">lockdown</a>, <a href="https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/locking-down-two-different-indias/article31210743.ece" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">unplanned and sudden</a>, has been a <a href="https://amnesty.org.in/news-update/the-battle-against-covid-19-must-not-leave-behind-the-poor-and-marginalised-communities-in-india/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">lethal blow</a> <a href="https://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-lockdown-migrant-movement-labour-death-delhi-agra-morena-6337959/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">for them</a>.</div>
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In the first week of the lockdown, <a href="http://www.uncat.org/banner/police-brutality-unwarranted-deaths-covid-19-lockdown/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">27 Indians</a> died according to the National Campaign Against Torture. Inside the detention centers meant to incarcerate foreigners in Assam in India’s northeast, this tale of horror assumes an even more terrible face. The hunt for foreigners or illegal migrants in Assam has been going on for many years. From 1979 to 1985, Assam witnessed a widespread and <a href="https://scroll.in/article/829682/why-was-assams-nellie-massacre-of-1983-not-prevented-despite-intimations-of-violence" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">violent</a> anti-foreigner movement that demanded detection of foreigners, their deletion from voter lists and their deportation to neighboring Bangladesh. The implicit assumption was equating foreigners with Bangladeshis. The Assam agitation ended with the signing of the Assam Accord in 1985, which led to <a href="https://issuu.com/aiindia/docs/assam_digest" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">special provisions</a> to determine Indian citizenship that was were only applicable to Assam. The agitation also had a demand to use the National Register of Citizens (NRC) 1951 that was based on the census of the same year to create a <em>legal</em> list of citizens. That demand for an NRC re-emerged and was set in motion in 2014, after the Supreme Court directed the state government to update the NRC list. Those not on the list have to face Foreigners’ Tribunals to prove their citizenship. In Assam, the Border Police and the State Election Commission can send notices to citizens suspected to be foreigners. The burden of proof lies on those marked as alleged foreigners; <u>a failure to do so, leads them to the detention centers.</u> The Citizenship (Amendment) Act 2019 (CAA) also lies within this <a href="https://epicenter.wcfia.harvard.edu/blog/who-citizen-contemporary-india" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">chase for foreigners</a><u>.</u></div>
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The detainees, packed in overcrowded rooms, are vulnerable at the best of times. Now it’s even worse. On 25 March 2020, a Guwahati-based organization called Justice and Liberty Initiative <a href="https://www.livelaw.in/top-stories/covid-19-plea-before-cji-seeks-release-of-persons-from-foreigners-detention-centres-in-assam-154334" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">submitted a representation </a>before the Chief Justice of India, seeking the release of all detainees, all of them in custody after being declared foreign nationals.</div>
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Lawyer Aman Wadud, who heads the organization, told me, that they can’t be sitting ducks for an infection that the entire world is trying to fight. “Detention centers are crowded. When the entire country is practicing social distancing, why should detainees live in crowded places? Often people are detained and sent to detention centers, what if they carry contagious diseases? Under any circumstance detaining declared foreigners, the way it is done in Assam, is unreasonable. In these testing times, let a historical wrong be corrected.”</div>
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<span class="epq-pull-quote epq-pull-quote-default epq-align-right">Detainees face punishment meant for criminals. In crowded prisons, rights of detainees are erased every day to the point of being non-existent.</span>There are <a href="https://www.business-standard.com/article/news-ani/as-on-march-6-802-persons-in-assam-s-detention-centres-govt-informs-rs-120031101036_1.html" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">802 detainees</a> lodged in <a href="https://mha.gov.in/MHA1/Par2017/pdfs/par2020-pdfs/ls-17032020/3880.pdf" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">six detention centers</a> across Assam. At least <a href="https://www.business-standard.com/article/pti-stories/10-inmates-of-detention-centres-in-assam-died-in-last-one-year-govt-120031700816_1.html" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">ten people died </a>in these centers in 2019 alone. There has been a <a href="https://indianexpress.com/article/north-east-india/assam/woman-lodged-in-assam-detention-camp-dies-6351177/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">total of 30 deaths</a> since 2016 in Assam. People who have spent time in the centers agree that they are worse than hell. There is no <a href="https://amnesty.org.in/assam-detention-centres/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">segregation between undertrials, convicts and detainees. </a>There is <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NRvDqHLJj-E" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">overcrowding and absence of basic hygiene.</a> Detainees face punishment meant for criminals. In crowded prisons, rights of detainees are erased every day to the point of being non-existent. The centers are almost like spaces of legal exception and indifference. A <a href="https://www.deccanherald.com/national/top-national-stories/harsh-manders-full-report-nhrc-678127.html" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">2018 report</a> on the six detention centers in Assam submitted by a former special monitor to the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Harsh Mander, clearly established how these centers are overcrowded. Mander resigned and made the report public after no action was taken by the NHRC. The report pointed out that the state did not make any distinction between detention centers and jails. The detention centers are in fact inside jail premises and the detainees add to the number of people who are incarcerated. According to the<a href="http://ncrb.gov.in/sites/default/files/psi_table_and_chapter_report/TABLE-1.2_1.pdf" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;"> latest statistics available</a> with the Ministry of Home Affairs’ National Crime Records Bureau, the general occupancy rates in all jails in Assam are at 93.2 per cent. In district jails of Assam, the percentage is at 103.03. Silchar, Goalpara, Tezpur, Kokrajhar, Dibrugarh, and Jorhat are all district jails inside which the detention centers are situated. A six-feet social distancing is an impossibility in such circumstances of congestion.</div>
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“Reaching the camp, I saw that there was no proper food, we didn’t get any bathing soap or oil or any such thing. We used to only get soaps that are used to wash clothes, the cheap ones. They used to give us food, which was fit for dogs and cats,” Ashraf Ali, a former detainee at the Goalpara detention center in Assam, told me when we met some time ago.</div>
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With him was his neighbor Kismat. Both of them had been sent to the same detention center, one of six in Assam meant for <a href="https://thewire.in/rights/the-death-of-amrit-das-and-the-search-for-foreigners-in-assam" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">people declared as foreign nationals</a> by the <a href="https://amnesty.org.in/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Assam-Foreigners-Tribunals-Report-1.pdf" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">Foreigners’ Tribunals.</a> That these tribunals exist to serve the government’s cause and not those of the people is an open secret.</div>
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“The room had a capacity of 40 people, but when we reached there it was filled with around 120 people. There was no space, we had to live on top of one another,” Kismat told me. “Ashraf and I slept next to the bathroom. It was dirty, we couldn’t sleep at all. Each of us had around two-two-and-a-half-feet of space. We were threatened. The convicts get much bigger beds. At that time, we were all put together – we shared space with convicts, all mixed. Each day the numbers increased. It was very hot, there was a fan, but it didn’t work. There was no space or peace.”</div>
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The rooms Kismat mentioned were roughly 80 feet by 21 feet–for 120 people. Ashraf and Kismat have left, but nothing has changed in the six detention centers, <a href="https://amnesty.org.in/news-update/india-covid-19-government-must-act-as-lives-at-risk-in-overcrowded-detention-centres-in-assam/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">even in 2020</a>.</div>
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<a href="https://issuu.com/aiindia/docs/assam_digest" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">Technically,</a> <em>declared foreigners</em> are detained not as a punishment but to wait before they are deported to their alleged country of citizenship. It’s like a waiting hall, Wadud adds, “but it is apparent that deportation is not foreseeable. In the last six years only four declared foreigners have been deported. If deportation is not possible, why detain them? Hence we feel that they should be released from the detention centers.”</div>
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<span class="epq-pull-quote epq-pull-quote-default epq-align-left">The treatment of detainees follows the pattern of stigmatization faced by people suspected to be foreigners in Assam for decades. There have been innumerable instances of genuine citizens being marked as “suspects,” as “foreigners” and then being harassed by a mob.</span>All these detainees are tried under <a href="https://indiankanoon.org/doc/27376/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">The Foreigners Act 1946</a>, which provides for non-incarcerative alternatives such as requiring a person to reside at a particular place, imposing restrictions on movement, requiring the person to check in with authorities periodically, prohibiting the person from associating with certain people or engaging in certain activities. Yet, as <a href="https://issuu.com/aiindia/docs/assam_digest" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">pointed out by Amnesty International</a>, detention has become the default option in Assam. <a href="https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/assam-seeks-10-more-detention-centres-to-hold-illegal-foreigners/story-fHtbCWAQQRWR0op8XM7QuM.html" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">The government plans to set up ten more detention centers.</a> The <a href="https://issuu.com/aiindia/docs/assam_digest" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">treatment of detainees</a> follows the pattern of stigmatization faced by people suspected to be foreigners in Assam for decades. There have been innumerable <a href="https://www.firstpost.com/india/assam-to-conduct-survey-of-indigenous-muslims-experts-term-move-divisive-say-classification-is-undemocratic-unconstitutional-8077351.html" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">instances</a> of genuine citizens being marked as “suspects,” as “foreigners” and then being <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-48278441" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">harassed</a> by a mob. There are a hundred <a href="https://amnesty.org.in/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Assam-Foreigners-Tribunals-Report-1.pdf" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">Foreigners’ Tribunals </a>in Assam, which decide if a person is a foreigner or not (or Indian or not). The burden of proof is on the person suspected to be a foreigner, or an infiltrator. Before this, a person suspected of being an illegal migrant was tried under the Illegal Migration (Determination by Tribunal) Act 1983 that was enacted as a response to the Assam agitation. The burden of proof was <a href="https://issuu.com/aiindia/docs/assam_digest" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">then</a> on the state agency or whoever accused a person as being a foreigner. <a href="https://indiankanoon.org/doc/907725/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">This was challenged before the Supreme Court and struck down, in 2005, as being too lenient.</a></div>
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This process of finding an illegal migrant has been in the spotlight because of a citizenship drive called the National Register of Citizens (NRC) that puts together a legal list of citizens. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/video/world/asia/100000006963057/modi-muslims-india-citizenship-test.html" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">The process has been found to be deeply biased </a>and in violation of basic constitutional rights granted to all Indian citizens: 1.9 million people in Assam have been left out of it and have to prove their citizenship. At the end of the process there is the <a href="https://www.thepolisproject.com/suddenly-stateless-conversation-series-v-procedure-as-violence/#.XoynDhMzafV" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">prospect of overcrowded detention centers and statelessness for thousands</a>.</div>
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<strong>Why can’t detainees be released?</strong></div>
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The Supreme Court of India recently took <em>suo motu</em> cognizance of a <a href="https://main.sci.gov.in/pdf/LU/16032020_100611.pdf" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">writ-petition</a> on overcrowding at prisons in the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak. The Court underlined that in India’s 1,339 prisons, there are at least 466,084 inmates and, according to the National Crime Records Bureau, <a href="https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/coronavirus-sc-directs-states-uts-to-set-up-panel-to-consider-release-of-prisoners-on-parole/article31142034.ece" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">the occupancy rate is at 117.6 %</a>. The Court further noted that in closed spaces such as prisons the chances of the COVID-19 virus spreading is high. It puts at risk not only the prisoners — old and new — but every single person associated with the prison. “We are of the opinion that there is an imminent need to take steps on an urgent basis to prevent the contagion of COVID-19 virus in our prisons,” the Court said.</div>
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The state of Uttar Pradesh, where overcrowding stands at 176.5%, <a href="https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/india-news-coronavirus-uttar-pradesh-to-release-11000-prisoners-on-parole-to-decongest-jails/349627" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">has decided </a>to release 11,000 prisoners from 71 facilities. This includes 8,500 undertrials and 2,500 convicts. All of them, face jail terms of seven years or less and hence, according to the Supreme Court’s instructions, are eligible for release. Maharashtra has <a href="https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/11000-prisoners-in-maharashtra-to-be-released-on-parole/articleshow/74834846.cms?from=mdr" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">decided to release </a>11,000 prisoners from its 60 jails. Prisoners have also been released from <a href="https://www.livemint.com/politics/news/as-coronavirus-cases-rise-indian-jails-begin-releasing-prisoners-on-bail-11585569499656.html" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">Delhi’s Tihar Jail</a>. In <a href="https://sabrangindia.in/article/covid-19-state-governments-continue-release-prisoners-parole-and-interim-bail" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">West Bengal</a>, 3,076 prisoners have been released. Assam has also released 722 undertrials.</div>
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In a 2013 judgment (<a href="https://indiankanoon.org/doc/63332651/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">Thana Singh versus Central Bureau of Narcotics</a>), the Supreme Court made an important observation about a person in a prison awaiting trial. The plight of the undertrial, said the Court, gains focus “only on a solicitous enquiry by this Court, and soon after, quickly fades into the backdrop.” In this context, <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4601414.stm" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">the story of Machan Lalung</a> in Assam is relevant. A member of the Tiwa community in Arunachal Pradesh, Machan was in prison for 54 years without any specific charge or facing trial. He was released in 2005 and died two years later. India’s undertrial population (<a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/10_YCJ8RArz-32Z4mdWBvDwBzuCHN65lD/view" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">the third highest in Asia</a>) and those who are in the six detention centers of Assam face the same indifference with which Machan was treated. It is ironic that it has come to the deadly COVID-19 pandemic to bring focus back on these lives in incarceration.</div>
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<span class="epq-pull-quote epq-pull-quote-default epq-align-right">Detainees should be released on personal recognizance bond irrespective of how many years they were in detention because they are not criminals.</span>The recent Supreme Court order says that prisons across India are overcrowded thus social distancing is an impossibility. The Court underlines that “contagious viruses such as COVID-19 virus proliferate in closed spaces such as prisons. Studies also establish that prison inmates are highly prone to contagious viruses. The rate of ingress and egress in prisons is very high, especially since persons (accused, convicts, detenues etc.) are brought to the prisons on a daily basis.” Detainees inside these prisons cannot be the exception to that observation. When it comes to detainees, the Assam government in its <em><u>White Paper on Foreigners’ Issue </u></em>(published on 20 October 2012 when there were only three detention centers) approved the use of detention for those declared as ‘“irregular foreigners”’ to restrict their movements and to ensure that they “do not perform the act of vanishing.” The reason was to keep a tab on individuals declared as foreigners, but for this detention is not required, says advocate Oliullah Laskar. “It can be done if they are released on bail.” Both Oliullah and Wadud agree that there has been no initiative on the part of the Government of India in respect of their deportation. During our interview, Oliullah recalls a Supreme Court panel on prison conditions headed by Justice Amitav Roy set up in 2018. It had recommended, among other things, that people who are otherwise entitled to bail and are unable to arrange surety should be released on a <a href="https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/overcrowding-staff-crunch-hit-country-s-jails-report/story-xw4T490dU6Ebtsm0DUJNuK.html" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">Personal Recognizance Bond.</a>This is important in the context of former Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi’s direction to release detainees who were in detention for more than three years on a surety of INR 200,000. In a recent decision, the Supreme Court also held that bail cannot be made conditional upon heavy deposits beyond the financial capacity of an applicant for bail. (<a href="https://indiankanoon.org/doc/70584133/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">Dhanapal versus State, (2019) 6 SCC 743</a>). Detainees should be released on personal recognizance bond irrespective of how many years they were in detention because they are not criminals. So far, Assam has only released undertrials.</div>
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A few months ago, I visited the site for an upcoming detention center in Assam’s Goalpara district. The project is in a 300,000-square-feet area and is designed to house 3,000 detainees — women, children and men. It will be the largest detention center in India: unreal, dystopian; high walls, watchtowers, searchlights; the signs of a dehumanized space ready to take away and wipe out rights. The place reminded me of a conversation with a doctor who was treating detainees at a center in Assam two years ago. “Most of the detainees suffer from depression,” he told me. “The main shortcomings in detention centers are that the environment is not healthy. They are not criminals, and yet the jail security guards treat them as criminals.” Former detainees, I met, had stories of fellow detainees suffering from <em>brain-short disease</em> — a word they use for acute psychosis, or even madness.</div>
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“Inside [the center where I was detained] there were 30-40 women in the room. There were very old people. 50-, 60-, even 80-year old people. There were young children too with their mothers. People used to cry a lot. Some of the women went hungry. There was immense sadness,” Rashminara Begum, a former detainee told me about two years ago, while recalling her time at in a detention center.</div>
<figure class="wp-caption alignnone" id="attachment_4929" style="background-color: #f3f3f3; border-radius: 3px; border: 1px solid rgb(221, 221, 221); margin: 10px; max-width: 95%; padding-top: 4px;"><img alt="" class="size-full wp-image-4929" height="3264" src="https://thepolisproject.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Rashminara.jpg" style="border: 0px none; height: auto; margin: 0px; max-width: 98%; padding: 0px;" width="4928" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text"><em>Photo by Arijit Sen</em></figcaption></figure><div style="font-size: 1.05em;">
In December 2019, I met Manikjan Bibi and Ashida Bibi in Bongaigaon. Manikjan was sent to a detention center by a Foreigners Tribunal and had been there for four years. She was released only after the Supreme Court’s direction to release those detainees who had spent more than three years in detention. She has to report to the local police station every week. Her name appeared on the final list of the National Register of Citizens but was removed after “‘someone”’ filed an objection. “At the detention center, I felt like I was in a graveyard. I have documents. I was born in India. My father and grandfather are Indians. I don’t know what else I should do,” she told me. Manikjan’s neighbor Ashida Bibi was also sent to a detention center for a year. Her husband died while she was inside, and she was not allowed to attend his funeral despite her requests. Ashida now works as a daily wage laborer. “I have all the documents,” she insists, “I still don’t know why I was sent to a detention center. My life has been destroyed.”</div>
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Inside the detention centers there are many others whose lives have been destroyed. They are stuck without any clue as to why they are there and are desperate to get out of the congested rooms.</div>
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According to Dr. Saptak Sarkar, a junior resident at Diamond Harbour Medical College and Hospital in West Bengal, congested rooms will fail to maintain all the criteria specified by either the Center for Disease Control for Interim Management in Correctional or Detention facilities or by the Ministry of Health in India for the COVID-19 prevention. “The virus mainly transmits through droplets emitting from other persons’ cough or sneezes; from direct contact or contact with used object and body fluid of COVID-19 positive individuals. Hence, the practice of social distancing and maintenance of proper hygiene in camps can prevent the spread many folds if not cease the spread for good.” It is therefore imperative need to free the detainees.</div>
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In response to the current emergency, there has <a href="https://cjp.org.in/cjp-demands-conversion-of-goalpara-detention-camp-into-corona-treatment-hospital/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">also been a call </a>from another NGO, the Committee for Justice and Peace, to convert that site for the new detention center into a hospital to treat COVID-19 patients, a sensible idea at a time when dignity and hope for the poor seem to be absent from lockdown policies. In addition to this, if the government has a change of heart and releases the detainees as Wadud demands, then perhaps this moment of crisis could be a small step towards something good.</div>
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<a href="https://www.livelaw.in/top-stories/covid-19-plea-before-cji-seeks-release-of-persons-from-foreigners-detention-centres-in-assam-154334" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">Justice and Liberty Initiative’s application</a> will be heard by the Supreme Court on 13 April 2020. In <a href="https://www.barandbench.com/news/litigation/sc-issues-notice-in-plea-seeking-release-of-detenues-in-assam-who-have-been-held-for-2-years" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">another petition</a>filed by detainee Rajubala Das, the Court has issued <a href="https://www.barandbench.com/news/litigation/sc-issues-notice-in-plea-seeking-release-of-detenues-in-assam-who-have-been-held-for-2-years" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">notices</a> to the Central Government and the Assam Government to file their reply and the matter will again be considered on the same date.</div>
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In Assam, lives have been lost, migrants have been stigmatized, people viewed with suspicion in the citizenship debate. This crisis, though, can be an opportunity, a page-turner for the detainees in Assam. Will the people in power do the right thing, though?</div>
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<em>Arijit Sen is an independent journalist based in Kolkata. Over the years he has been covering the northeast as a reporter and researcher, apart from traveling the region during a stint with Amnesty International. He tweets <a href="https://twitter.com/senarijit" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">@senarijit</a>. </em></div>
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The essay was first published in <a href="https://www.thepolisproject.com/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">the Polis Project</a> and it is reposted here verbatim for wider dissemination. The original piece can be accessed <a href="https://www.thepolisproject.com/covid-19-pandemic-an-opportunity-for-assam-to-correct-a-historical-wrong/#.XpBJlvgzbIW" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration-line: none;">here</a>.</div>
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RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-13240447699574003222018-04-29T10:54:00.000+05:302018-04-29T10:54:07.249+05:30Immigration and demographic transformation of Assam<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Susanta Krishna Dass studied the problem of immigration and demographic transformation of Assam and published a paper with the findings that:</div>
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(1) Since 1951, the rate of increase of Assam's population has been much higher than that of the country as a whole or of any state or province. But unlike in other states, this heavy increase has been due to (a) an acceleration of the natural rate of increase; (b) influx of Hindu refugees from East Pakistan; and (c) heavier migration of Indians from the rest of the country.</div>
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(2) The tremendous swelling in the number of the, Assamese speaking population during 1911-31 as a consequence of people belonging to other language groups adopting Assamese language is a unique instance of its kind.</div>
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(3) Apprehensions about the infiltration of Bangladeshi or East Pakistani Muslims into Assam appear not to be supported by facts. The fact is that while it was mainly the Bengali Muslims, motivated by economic as well as political factors, who migrated to Assam between 1891 and 1947, such migration as has taken place' since 1947, almost entirely due to political reasons, has been of Bengali Hindus.</div>
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On the specific problem of Muslim infiltration he had to say:</div>
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There is a general and widely held apprehension, both in Assam and in the rest of the country, about 'Muslim infiltration' in the state. "The frustration is further fueled by fears that in the not too distant future, they may be swamped by 'foreign nationals', mostly Muslims from Bangladesh". It is presumed that such Muslim 'infiltrators' into Assam got assimilated with the Assamese speaking population following the practice of their predecessors.</div>
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If this presumption is correct, two things must follow. First, being an addition to the bonafide Muslim, nationals living in Assam, and given their natural rate of increase which is generally higher than that of the Hindus, there should have been a steep rise in the Muslim population of Assam, at least at a rate higher than that of the Muslim population in the rest of the country. Secondly, since these are supposed to have adopted Assamese, there should have been an equally steep hike in the Assamese speaking population. It has been found above that between 1951-71, there was no hike in the Assamese speaking population and the rate of increase was quite normal in the decade 1961-71. This part of the presumption is thus not tenable.</div>
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Table 9 presents the distribution of Assam's population by religion, all other conditions remaining same as those of Table 7. The Table shows that between 1951-71, Muslim population of Assam varied almost at par with its Hindu counterpart. There was no hike. This is further confirmed by the fact that during the decade 1961-71, the Muslim population declined by --0.74 per cent of the total population of the state, the link relative rate of variation also being lower than that for the Hindus and the Christians. This, along with the slow natural rate of increase of the Assamese speaking population, shows that the apprehension of 'infiltration' of 'Bengali Muslims' between 1951-71 is not statistically<br />valid. An interesting corroborating factor that emerges out of Table 9 is that other than between 1911-31, the increase of the Muslim population was never higher than that of its Hindu counterpart. This tallies with the huge immigration of Bengali Muslim cultivators<br />that took place between 1911-31.</div>
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When the distribution of population by religion of Assam for the decade 1961-71 is compared with that of India, it is found that (i) the Hindu population of India as percentage of total population declined during this period by --0.78 per cent while that of Assam increased by 1.18 per cent; (ii) the Muslim population of India went up by 0.50 per cent while that of Assam declined by --0.74 per cent; (iii) the Christian population of Assam increased at a faster rate than that of India and (iv) rate of increase was lowest for the Muslims of Assam compared to the Hindus and the Christians. All these are evident from Table 10.</div>
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These lower figures for the Muslim population of Assam in all respects compared to those for the Indian Muslims also confirms that apprehensions about 'infiltration' of 'Bangladeshi Muslims' are not factually tenable. This also reveals that since the people opting for adoption, namely, the Bengali Muslims, have become scarce, the Assamese language has failed to swell since 1951.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2QDg3QtG4yYeuSwThsB9DlcaQ8lo-JpKIfVUBx3d4AigE0Gdek9d_8wNfN1ZjnVO6AGN2Oerjte8HepEP58yT3VQxJ9Lzho8NiK_MWwH_X1S4Mr3WtAIJFXypHn0-FFVcZ6CB_EqUGrs/s1600/191974_10151183807596563_1269752051_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="780" data-original-width="1021" height="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2QDg3QtG4yYeuSwThsB9DlcaQ8lo-JpKIfVUBx3d4AigE0Gdek9d_8wNfN1ZjnVO6AGN2Oerjte8HepEP58yT3VQxJ9Lzho8NiK_MWwH_X1S4Mr3WtAIJFXypHn0-FFVcZ6CB_EqUGrs/s320/191974_10151183807596563_1269752051_o.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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Source: Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 15, No. 19 (May 10, 1980), pp. 850-859</div>
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RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-70501592209808560442017-04-07T08:43:00.000+05:302017-04-07T08:43:55.940+05:30Law relating to cow slaughter in Assam<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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They have started cow vigilatism in Assam also. According to <a href="https://thewire.in/121819/three-muslims-including-a-minor-arrested-in-assam-on-charges-of-possessing-beef-for-consumption/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">a report</a>, three people, including a minor, were arrested from Jorhat town in Assam on April 4 for carrying beef and thereby hurting the religious sentiments of some people. The first incident is by police in the name of law enforcement. But there are concerns that the private groups of vigilantes may start to go on the rampage like in the states of North India.</div>
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So, it is better to have a look at the law relating to cow slaughter in Assam.</div>
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In North East India there is no law prohibiting or regulating cow slaughter in the states of Manipur, Mizoram, Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim, Tripura and Nagaland.</div>
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But not in Assam. In the state there is a state legislation called the Assam Cattle Preservation Act, 1950 that prohibits slaughter of certain types of cattle. The Act defines “cattle” as `Bulls, bullocks, cows, calves, male and female buffaloes and buffalo calves. Section 5 provides that the cattle can only be slaughtered on a certificate of ‘fit for slaughter’ given by a veterinary officer for the area if cattle is over 14 years of age or has become permanently incapacitated for work or breeding due to injury, deformity or any incurable disease and according to section 6 such cattle can be slaughtered only in places specified for this purpose. The offence under the Act may attract punishment of imprisonment up to maximum of 6 months or fine of up to Rs 1,000 or both and it is a cognisable offence.</div>
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However, section 13 empowers the state government to to impose, exempt from the operation of this Act, the slaughter of any cattle for any religious, ceremonial, medical research or any other purposes. It also states that “the operation of the Act will not be applicable to the slaughter of any cattle on the occasion of Id-uz-Zuha festival on such conditions as the State Government may specify regarding privacy”.</div>
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It is obvious that the Act does not absolutely prohibit slaughter of cow. It only regulates cattle slaughter. But the provisions are vulnerable to be misused. The problem is that they don't much care for the laws. The law nowhere prohibits carrying and eating of beef.<b></b><i></i><u></u><sub></sub><sup></sup><strike></strike></div>
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RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-8314516773796202332017-03-26T17:19:00.000+05:302017-03-26T17:19:57.506+05:30Muslim women voting for Yogi Adityanath should be the last nail in the coffin of triple talaq<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span data-offset-key="deo4r-0-0"><span data-text="true"><b>It is claimed that many Muslim women in UP voted for Yogi Adityanath's BJP. Yes, the Yogi whose supporters, in his presence, asked Hindus to excavate graves of Muslim women and rape their dead bodies. They voted him, it is said, because Adityanath promised to protect them from the scrouge of triple talaq.</b></span></span></div>
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<span data-offset-key="6stvr-0-0"><span data-text="true">If there is even an iota of truth in this claim it should have dealt a huge blow along the spine, if they have any, of the community compelling them to seriously work on the issue of triple talaq and other laws and practices oppressive and unjust to women.</span></span></div>
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<span data-offset-key="6mlis-0-0"><br data-text="true" /></span></div>
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<span data-offset-key="91vac-0-0"><span data-text="true">I don't see any reasons to disbelief this claim as something similar happened during the first part of 20th century. This was before passing of <b>the Dissolution of Muslim Marriages Act, 1939</b>. Muslim law as it was practised at that time didn't provide for ways to get rid of husbands even if it was not possible for the women to continue to live with their husbands except by committing suicide, or becoming apostate. The later was far more easier as Christian missionaries also came to their rescue. Women only need to utter some words declaring their unbelief of Islam. Muftis would declare them apostate and consequently their marriages dissolved. Women increasingly resrted to this device.</span></span></div>
<div class="_1mf _1mj" data-block="true" data-editor="146gk" data-offset-key="981k-0-0" style="text-align: justify;">
<span data-offset-key="981k-0-0"><br data-text="true" /></span></div>
<div class="_1mf _1mj" data-block="true" data-editor="146gk" data-offset-key="4mupf-0-0" style="text-align: justify;">
<span data-offset-key="4mupf-0-0"><span data-text="true">This dealt a huge blow to the Muslim leaders and intellectuals of the time. The philosopher and poet Allama Muhammad Iqbal led a campaign for reforms of relevant parts of the Muslim law forcing a conservative Deobandi Mufti like Maulana Ashraf Ali Thanvi to revise the laws/fatwas. In 1931, after several years of extensive consultations with muftis in </span></span><span data-offset-key="3nkl6-0-0"><span data-text="true">India and abroad, he published a long fatwa entitled "<b>al-Hilat al-Najiza li'l-Halilat al-'Ajiza</b>" (A Successful Legal Device for the Helpless Wife). In the revised fatwa, Maulana Thanvi argued that apostasy did not annul the marriage contract and could not be used as a legal device. He agreed that judicial divorce might be used to provide relief to Hanafi Muslim women, invoking Maliki doctrine in support of this point. (See <b>Muhammad Khalid Masud, "Islamic Legal Interpretation: Muftis and Their Fatwas</b>" (Harvard University Press, 1996) Chapter Sixteen, pp. 193-203.)</span></span></div>
<div class="_1mf _1mj" data-block="true" data-editor="146gk" data-offset-key="631lh-0-0" style="text-align: justify;">
<span data-offset-key="631lh-0-0"><br data-text="true" /></span></div>
<div class="_1mf _1mj" data-block="true" data-editor="146gk" data-offset-key="cee9-0-0" style="text-align: justify;">
<span data-offset-key="cee9-0-0"><span data-text="true">This booklet provided the basis of the Dissolution of Muslim Marriages Act, 1939. The Act provides for ten grounds for Muslim women to obtain a decree of the dissolution of marriage from a court of law. A decree for dissolving marriage made avaialable for the reasons that for a term of four years the particulars about the husband are unknown, the woman has been abandoned by the husband or he failed to provide maintenance for the woman for a term of two years, the husband has married another woman contravening the provisions of Muslim Family laws Ordinance, 1961, the husband has been subject to imprisonment for a term of seven years or more etc., the nonperformance of marital obligations, impotency, insanity, leprosy, virulent venereal disease, cruelty etc. or any other legal causes can be taken as ground for getting divorce. This Act is still in force.</span></span></div>
<div class="_1mf _1mj" data-block="true" data-editor="146gk" data-offset-key="28e9h-0-0" style="text-align: justify;">
<span data-offset-key="28e9h-0-0"><br data-text="true" /></span></div>
<div class="_1mf _1mj" data-block="true" data-editor="146gk" data-offset-key="f1m5f-0-0" style="text-align: justify;">
<span data-offset-key="f1m5f-0-0"><span data-text="true">It is obvious that this time there is no Muslim intellectual who has the courage to follow the foot steps of Allama Iqbal and lead a campaign and force the likes of Maulana Ashraf Ali Thanvi <b>to revisit the laws and abolish triple talaq and polygamy.</b> </span></span></div>
<div class="_1mf _1mj" data-block="true" data-editor="146gk" data-offset-key="cfcvt-0-0" style="text-align: justify;">
<span data-offset-key="cfcvt-0-0"><br data-text="true" /></span></div>
<div class="_1mf _1mj" data-block="true" data-editor="146gk" data-offset-key="aof05-0-0" style="text-align: justify;">
<span data-offset-key="aof05-0-0"></span><b></b><i></i><u></u><sub></sub><sup></sup><strike></strike><br /></div>
</div>
RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-5087861425556444572015-07-03T00:40:00.000+05:302015-07-03T00:40:20.984+05:30Assam: Farce of NRC updation may lead millions to statelessness<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
Updating process of NRC (National Register of Citizens) is going on in Assam. Those who have their names in 1951 NRC, any electoral rolls issued upto 1971 or any other of the 14 documents mentioned in application form are eligible to be included in the updated NRC.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
Parts of 1951 NRC and some electoral rolls of pre-1971 period have been made available online and termed "legacy data".</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
The NRC which is under preparation is not a new NRC. It is an updating process of 1951 NRC which was prepared on the basis of census data of 1951. However, section 15 of the Census Act, 1948 says that records of census are not admissible in evidence notwithstanding<wbr></wbr><span class="word_break" style="display: inline-block;"></span> anything contrary in the India Evidence Act, 1872. Moreover, 1951 NRC data for many areas of the state are not available. Not prepared at all or subsequently destroyed.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
Not all electoral rolls upto 1971 are available. Only electoral rolls of 1966 and 1971 have been made available online. But they also don't cover the whole of Assam. For many areas electoral roll of 1966 is not available.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
Legacy data for the districts of the United Khasi and Jaintia Hills, the Naga Hills and the Mizo Hills, which were part of Assam until they were separated in 1972 are not made available.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
Apart from variations in spelling of the names and other anomalies in legacy data it has now came to light that names of many people are not found. Adivasi organisations are claiming that around 80% of their people does not have names in legacy data while authorities says that only about 10% does not have. My guesstimate is that about 20% of people of all communities may not find their names in legacy data.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
The other 14 documents that can be submitted must be pre-1971 origin. How can one accept that poor people of villages in this flood affected state to preserve their pre-1971 papers. Assam is the state with highest IDPs in the world. Then, there are lakhs of landless and homeless people.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: small; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">
This farce of updation of NRC based on an inadmissible document, if carried to its conclusion and is taken as the basis of citizenship, may drive about 20% of about 31 million people to statelessness.</div>
</div>
RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-31140173251450707232015-06-28T21:41:00.001+05:302015-06-28T21:46:54.449+05:30Supreme Court diecrtives regarding arrest of accused by police for offences punishable with seven years imprisonment or less<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif;">Supreme Court Guidelines regarding arrests of the accused by the police in cases punishable with 7 years imprisonment or less issued Arnesh Kumar Vs. State of Bihar and Another (Criminal Appeal No. 1277 of 2014):</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div id="p_24" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
1.All the State Governments to instruct its police officers not to automatically arrest when a case under <a href="http://indiankanoon.org/doc/538436/" id="a_35" style="color: #1100cc; text-decoration: none;">Section 498-A</a> of the IPC is registered but to satisfy themselves about the necessity for arrest under the parameters laid down above flowing from <a href="http://indiankanoon.org/doc/1763444/" id="a_36" style="color: #1100cc; text-decoration: none;">Section 41</a>, <a href="http://indiankanoon.org/doc/445276/" id="a_37" style="color: #1100cc; text-decoration: none;">Cr.PC</a>;</div>
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<br /></div>
<div id="p_25" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
2. All police officers be provided with a check list containing specified sub- clauses under <a href="http://indiankanoon.org/doc/1763444/" id="a_38" style="color: #1100cc; text-decoration: none;">Section 41(1)(b)(ii)</a>;</div>
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<br /></div>
<div id="p_26" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
3. The police officer shall forward the check list duly filed and furnish the reasons and materials which necessitated the arrest, while forwarding/producing the accused before the Magistrate for further detention;</div>
<div id="p_26" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div id="p_27" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
4. The Magistrate while authorising detention of the accused shall peruse the report furnished by the police officer in terms aforesaid and only after recording its satisfaction, the Magistrate will authorise detention;</div>
<div id="p_27" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div id="p_28" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
5. The decision not to arrest an accused, be forwarded to the Magistrate within two weeks from the date of the institution of the case with a copy to the Magistrate which may be extended by the Superintendent of police of the district for the reasons to be recorded in writing;</div>
<div id="p_28" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div id="p_29" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
6. Notice of appearance in terms of <a href="http://indiankanoon.org/doc/445276/" id="a_39" style="color: #1100cc; text-decoration: none;">Section 41A</a> of Cr.PC be served on the accused within two weeks from the date of institution of the case, which may be extended by the Superintendent of Police of the District for the reasons to be recorded in writing;</div>
<div id="p_29" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div id="p_30" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
7. Failure to comply with the directions aforesaid shall apart from rendering the police officers concerned liable for departmental action, they shall also be liable to be punished for contempt of court to be instituted before High Court having territorial jurisdiction.</div>
<div id="p_30" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div id="p_31" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
8. Authorising detention without recording reasons as aforesaid by the judicial Magistrate concerned shall be liable for departmental action by the appropriate High Court.</div>
<div id="p_31" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div id="p_32" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
9. We hasten to add that the directions aforesaid shall not only apply to the cases under <a href="http://indiankanoon.org/doc/538436/" id="a_40" style="color: #1100cc; text-decoration: none;">Section 498-A</a> of the I.P.C. or <a href="http://indiankanoon.org/doc/1023340/" id="a_41" style="color: #1100cc; text-decoration: none;">Section 4</a> of the Dowry Prohibition Act, the case in hand, but also such cases where offence is punishable with imprisonment for a term which may be less than seven years or which may extend to seven years; whether with or without fine.</div>
<div id="p_32" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div id="p_33" style="font-family: georgia, sans-serif, serif, arial; line-height: 24.375px; text-align: justify;">
10. We direct that a copy of this judgment be forwarded to the Chief Secretaries as also the Director Generals of Police of all the State Governments and the Union Territories and the Registrar General of all the High Courts for onward transmission and ensuring its compliance.</div>
</div>
RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-58425406430569826102014-12-07T15:25:00.000+05:302014-12-07T15:25:17.785+05:30Sex work: To criminalize or to decriminalize?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
National Commission for Women is pushing for a bill to
legalise sex work. Activists argue that it will not address the problems faced
by the women in flesh trade. According to them, it will increase the exploitation
of sex workers by those who manage brothels as well as by the law-enforcement
officials, as it is happening now. They are concerned that in a country like India where
farmers are driven to commit suicide and tea workers are literally dying of
hunger, legalisation of sex work will increase trafficking in women and
children. It will be difficult to determine who are forced into the trade and
who have freely chosen it as an occupation when they are living in a condition
of famine and slavery.<br />
<br />
By the way, speaking of free choice, I am reminded of the public stand of
present NCW chief on the matter. She is on record saying that women should not
assert their autonomy because they may face backlash from the biased society.
It is another matter that the statutory body headed by her is mandated to
protect the rights of women against the prejudices of society and not the other
way around.<br />
<br />
This NCW wants to legalise sex work apparently to protect rights and interests
of women in the trade.<br />
<br />
However, before we take any legislative actions we need to understand what is
involved in flesh trade and how it is infringing rights of women.<br />
<br />
Radical feminists hold that prostitution and pornography are aspects of male
violence against women. Not only the individual women involved are subjected to
degrading treatments and dehumanisation but the women as a collective is
dehumanised by the practice of prostitution and pornography. <br />
<br />
However, I feel more inclined to agree with the understanding of prostitution
by the Swedish lawmakers. They say "In Sweden prostitution is regarded as
an aspect of male violence against women and children. It is officially
acknowledged as a form of exploitation of women and children and constitutes a
significant social problem... gender equality will remain unattainable so long
as men buy, sell and exploit women and children by prostituting them."<br />
<br />
And their solution? <br />
<br />
In 1999, after years of research and study, Sweden passed a legislation that a)
criminalizes the buying of sex, and b) decriminalizes the selling of sex.<br />
<br />
I think India
can effectively deal with the problem in Swedish way.</div>
</div>
RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-66181117238292931112014-12-06T13:43:00.000+05:302014-12-08T14:24:00.692+05:30Stopping supply of subsidised foodgrains for tea workers causes serious concerns<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The Union Government of India has <a href="http://www.assamtribune.com/scripts/detailsnew.asp?id=dec0414/at053" target="_blank">decided</a> to stop supply of subsidised foodgrains for tea
garden workers through FCI.*<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
This is a very very unfortunate development. It may cause mass starvation
deaths of tea workers in Assam.
Particularly in those tea estates which are closed now.<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Even in the gardens which are producing, labourers are paid as less as Rs 75/-
per day. It is barely possible to maintain physical existence of a family of
4/5 persons on this money. They get some help from ICDS, MGNREGA and PDS
rations. If MGNREGA is reduced and ration is stopped there is nothing to stop
mass starvation deaths, I am afraid.<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
In a span of a few months in 2012/13 we documented as many as 32 hunger deaths
in a single tea estate in South Assam. The
estate was closed. After our intervention it was opened. A compensation to the
tune of Rs 1700000/- was provided to the next of kins of some of the deceased workers. Some other ameliorative actions were also
taken. It was a temporary relief in practical sense. Technically the government
closed the chapter.<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
During documentation we came to know that due to the closure of the work
provisions of government subsidised rations were also stopped. The foodgrains were
provided to the owner of the tea gardens under the Essential Commodities Act,
1955 and who in turn distributed it to the workers who were the intended
beneficiaries.<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) heard and disposed of our complaint about these hunger deaths in its
camp sitting in Guwahati last year. In the second day of the camp, the
commission had a sitting with the local human rights defenders where I raised
the issue and among other things I specifically stressed that the ration should
be directly given to the labourers through their panchayats and not through the
owners. The commission apparently was convinced and directed the officials
present (a deputy home secretary and others) orally to consider my proposal.
Though the state government kept giving us assurances but no change in the
practice was made.<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
And now the Modi government decided to stop altogether the supply of rations to
the labourers.<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
I am really very concerned about the tea labourers of Assam.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
----------------------</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">* As reported by the Assam Tribune accessed at <a href="http://lm.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.assamtribune.com%2Fscripts%2Fdetailsnew.asp%3Fid%3Ddec0414%252Fat053&h=CAQGouCb6&enc=AZPX58Qi2jFKsGHbHY8CYG2pOeSl_aOJhYCmRlFlonliuxphMnrunoHarnM2iGvduh0&s=1" target="_blank">http://www.assamtribune.com/scripts/detailsnew.asp?id=dec0414/at053</a></span> </div>
</div>
RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-14841708921672077022014-12-05T20:04:00.000+05:302014-12-05T20:04:08.949+05:30Why I Support Indo-Bangla Land Boundary Agreement?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The Indo-Bangla Land Boundary Agreement is a mere formality. But this
formality will end virtual statelessness of more than 51 thousand
people.<br /> <br /> According to a report, 37,334 Indians are residing in
111 enclaves in Bangladesh that spread over 17,000 acres and 14,215
Bangladeshi people are residing in 51 enclaves in India that spread over
7,110 acres. As these 51,549 people are living in land-locked parcels
of land situated within another country they can not exercise and avail
any of the rights and amenities which citizens are provided with by the
constitution and laws of their respective countries. They are virtually
stateless people. <br /> <br /> The Land Boundary Agreement was first signed
by Indira Gandhi and Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in 1974 stipulated that both
countries would exchange the enclaves of land that both countries had
within each other's territory. India even agreed to forgo compensation
for land that would be transferred to Bangladesh. India would lose about
40 square kilometres of land. But it is a matter of formality since
there is no sensible ways to use these lands as they sit in small
enclaves within another country. <br /> <br /> As per the agreement, people
living in the enclaves would be given a choice either to go to their
country or to stay where they were living by becoming the citizens of
that country. It is reported that no significant exchange of population
would be involved as people reportedly wanted to stay where they were
living for generations.<br /> <br /> Bangladesh parliament ratified the
agreement but India did not. When, after decades, the Manmohan Singh
government attempted to move the constitutional amendment bill required
for ratification of the agreement in parliament in 2013, it was strongly
opposed by BJP and regional parties like TMC and AGP. <br /> <br /> But now
that the Parliamentary Standing Committee on External Affairs tabled
its report in which it recommended that the constitution amendement bill
be moved to end the boundary issue between the two nations and the
Prime Minister also announced his intention to go ahead with the bill, I
hope, it will be passed and these 51 thousand odd stateless people will
get some relief.</div>
</div>
RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-2282546181921692792014-11-30T14:03:00.000+05:302014-11-30T14:03:45.438+05:30India needs 'SMART' policing to maintain law and order: PM Modi <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span>Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed his concerns about the
image of police in public mind. He said the mental image that people
have with regard to police has to change. It is good that he noticed it
and thought something was needed to be done about it. But unfortunately
his diagnosis and prescription were utterly wrong. He thought it was the
negative portrayal of police in Bollywood cinemas which was responsible
for distrust of people in the law-enforcement</span> forces. The medicine, according to him, is wearing make-ups. He said,
“Every police thana (police station) should have a website to propagate
good deeds done by the force. Each thana should upload one positive
story a week, which shows the good work done by them,” said the PM.</div>
<div class="t" style="text-align: justify;">
<br />
It is not surprising that he is asking for image make-over by masks and
make-ups after the huge success of the art in his own case. <br /> <br />
The root of the ills that plague policing in India lies deep in
history. The police force in India was set up after 1857 war of
independence. The constituting statute was passed in 1861 which is still
in force and governs policing as mother statute of all other police
Acts. The force was conceptualised by the servants of the Queen as
protectors of the interest of Her Highness in her Indian colonies and to
repress people and their voices. True to their founding objectives the
force served the Queen well during her regime and after that her
successors even after independence. <br /> <br /> Although there are legal
protection for the police in Police Acts as well as in the Criminal
Procedure Code, 1973, cases of police atrocities started coming up to
the High Courts and the Supreme Court when after independence democracy
started to percolate and deepen in remote towns and rural India. And
after growth of mass media they also began to pick up stories of police
atrocities, torture and killings. It is not the stories of the inhuman
deeds which are responsible for the bad image of the police but it is
the deeds themselves which are responsible. অন্ধ হলে কি প্রলয় বন্ধ থাকে?
(Does disaster stops if you shut your eyes up?)<br /> <br /> For decades
there was a movement by human rights activists, police officers,
lawyers, judges and common people for police reform. As a part of this
movement, two former director generals of police moved tthe Supreme
Court in 1996 requesting the Court to direct central and state
governments to address the most glaring gaps and bad practice in the
functioning of the police.<br /> <br /><span> After a decade, on 22
September 2006, the Supreme Court of India delivered a historic judgment
directing central and state governments to implement a set of seven
directives laying down practical mechanisms to kick-start police reform.
The Court's directives seek to achieve two main objectives: functional
autonomy for the police - through security of tenure, streamlined
appointment and transfer processes, and the creation of a "buffer body"
between the police and the government - and enhanced police
accountability,</span><wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span> both for organisational performance and individual misconduct. The case is know as Prakash Singh vs. Union of India.<br /> <br />
Central government has yet to comply with the directives and the
responses of the states are tremendously varied. In short, most of them
did not comply with the directives in their letter and spirit. In
response to the directives the Assam government passed the its state
police Act in 2007. It is, in fact, was an effort to bypass the Supreme
Court order.<br /> <br /><span> Reforming laws governing policing in
compliance with the Supreme Court directives would only be the first
step towards a long journey in the direction of building a
law-enforcement</span><wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span><span> institution which itself follows laws, protects rights of the people and enforces laws democratically.</span><wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span> <br /> <br /> Wearing masks or makeups would lead us nowhere.</div>
</div>
RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-43237983333451971962014-10-07T11:06:00.000+05:302014-12-09T15:34:38.767+05:30Tea Workers: Don’t stop rations without rationalizing labour laws<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The Union Government of India has decided to stop supply of subsidised
foodgrains for tea garden workers through FCI. This is a very
unfortunate development. It may cause mass starvation deaths of tea
workers in Assam. Particularly in those tea estates which are closed
now.<br /><br /> The labour rules and practice of tea gardens are governed
by laws codified in the Plantation Labour Act, 1951. The Act provides
for part payment of wages in kind in the forms of rations, housing,
health care etc. and part in cash. The payment in cash falls far below
the minimum wages determined under the Minimum Wages Act, 1948 for
unskilled labour and the facilities meant to be provided in lieu of
payment are not provided in reality as was found by several civil
society fact-findings as well as government appointed inquiry
committees. <br /><br /> The Act perpetuates anachronistic feudal labour
practice by allowing archaic mode of payment in kind. In fact, the tea
workers are working under a practice of modern day slavery. They are
also living in a condition of enforced famine.<br /><br /><span> The
labourers have been living for hundreds of years-- generation after
generation-- in their respective tea gardens. They do not hold any title
of ownership over the land. They are only entitled to stay there as
long as they work in the garden. They can be forcibly evicted from their
huts and made homeless if they opt for any other work. Thus they are
forced to work at wages which their owner pleases to pay them and which
is far below the state minimum wages in all cases. In some tea gardens
in Assam they are paid about Rs. 75/- 78/- or 85/</span></div>
<div class="t" style="text-align: justify;">
<wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span>-
per day. When labourers demand hike of wages or payment of arrears the
the gardens are illegally closed down and payments are stopped. This
drives the labourers and their children, who are suffering from
inter-generationl malnutrition, to literal starvation death. This is
happening in Assam and West Bengal. Most of the labour unions are
affiliated to political parties. Their priority is protect the interests
of the political parties, not those of workers. The workers are living,
nay dying, in a condition of artificial famine and working in a
condition of slavery. <br /> <br /> The working conditions of tea labourers
in Assam is slavery-like for two reasons. 1. They are paid less than
the statutory minimum wages. 2. They practically cant exercise the
option to leave the work and look for alternative because such move will
render them homeless. <br /> <br /> It is barely possible to maintain
physical existence of a family of 4/5 persons on the irregular payment
of the pittance in the name of wages. They get some help from ICDS,
MGNREGA and PDS rations. If MGNREGA is reduced and ration is stopped
there is nothing to stop mass starvation deaths, I am afraid.<br /> <br />
In a span of a few months in 2012/13 we documented as many as 32 hunger
deaths in a single tea estate in South Assam. The estate was closed.
After our intervention it was opened. A compensation to the tune of Rs
1700000/- was provided to the next of kins of some of the deceased
workers. Some other ameliorative actions were also taken. It was a
temporary relief in practical sense. Technically the government closed
the chapter.<br /> During documentation we came to know that due to the
closure of the work provisions of government subsidised rations were
also stopped. The foodgrains were provided to the owner of the tea
gardens under the Essential Commodities Act, 1955 and who in turn
distributed it to the workers who were the intended beneficiaries.<br /> <br />
The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) heard and disposed of our
complaint about these hunger deaths in its camp sitting in Guwahati last
year. In the second day of the camp, the commission had a sitting with
the local human rights defenders where I raised the issue and among
other things I specifically stressed that the ration should be directly
given to the labourers through their panchayats and not through the
owners. The commission apparently was convinced and directed the
officials present (a deputy home secretary and others) orally to
consider my proposal. Though the state government kept giving us
assurances but no change in the practice was made.<br /> <br /> And now the Modi government decided to stop altogether the supply of rations to the labourers.<br /> <br />
In this situations it is necessary that until and unless the labourers
are paid statutory minimum wages under the Minimum Wages Act, 1948 and
they are provided with foods under the Food Security Act, 2013, the
government should not stop the supply of rations that have been being
provided to them under the Essential Commodities Act, 1955. <br /> <br />
For this, the central government needs to amend the Plantations Labour
Act, 1951 that governs working conditions of tea labourers. The required
amendment must be done as soon as possible.<br /> <br /> Stopping rations without rationalising plantation labour laws would result in mass starvation deaths of tea workers.<br /> <br /> To know more about hunger deaths of tea workers of Assam please visit: <a href="https://m.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fbhrpc.wordpress.com%2Fbhrpc.wordpress.com%2F2012%2F03%2F17%2Freports-on-starvation-deaths-in-assam%2F&h=tAQFpqU0N&enc=AZMk5er-hmKObZOsVjadegS_5xInLadzGkVrCylNGWoQt7eWUQi3Dg373Y8dSN83InQ&s=1" target="_blank"><span>https://</span><wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span><span>bhrpc.wordpress.</span><wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span><span>com/</span><wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span><span>bhrpc.wordpress.</span><wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span><span>com/2012/03/17/</span><wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span><span>reports-on-starv</span><wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span><span>ation-deaths-in</span><wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span>-assam/</a><br /> </div>
</div>
RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-8503283542432856732014-10-04T09:43:00.000+05:302014-10-04T09:43:09.985+05:30The Muslims and ISIS<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Those who think themselves Muslims but do not endorse the brutality of
ISIS should not condemn the acts of barbarity by the latter as only
apologies for being Muslims. It should not be an apology. Also, the
verbal condemnation is not enough. Such Muslims owe it to the world and
to their claim that Islam has nothing to do with such madness of
violence and brutality that they should make their version of Islam
triumphant over that of ISIS and capable of stopping this madness. It is
primarily the responsibility of such Muslims because those madmen in
the group come from Muslim societies and are using Islam and plight of
Muslim societies to justify their madness.<br /> <br /> The sense of this
responsibility should not come from any sense of collective guilt or as a
collective punishment. This responsibility comes from you being true to
your claims about your faith and ideology and the claimed commitment of
your faith promote well being of humankind and prevent harms to them
(al-amr bil-ma'roof wan-nahyu a'n-al munkar) and also because the harm
is coming from your house.<br /> <br /> Some may ask why single out ISIS
only when killings and atrocities are being committed by many others far
more in numbers. They may cite killings of civilians by USA and NATO
drones in Pakistan, Afghanistan and other West Asian countries, Israeli
killings in Gaza, executions in Iran, Saudi Arabia and other Arab
countries, atrocities of China in Tibet and Xinjiang etc. This argument
does not hold ground because two wrongs do not make a right. Atrocities
any where in the world are unacceptable and condemnable. All should
work to prevent them. Every killing is brutal and tragic, whether it is
crude beheading or surgical droning. But killing of people like British
aid worker Alan Henning is more tragic. He was there trying to save
people. Killing of children in their sleeps are also more tragic. Those
who claim to be Muslim and also claim that their Islam does not allow
such killings should work more to stop this barbarism being committed in
their name.</div>
RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-83212396920683979832012-10-16T10:39:00.000+05:302012-10-16T10:39:02.085+05:30“Tackling poverty requires improving access to justice for the poor” – UN expert on extreme poverty<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3mHTAYqiIo8BtkJSXe1H_ab9Ef200f_dktJU-5TTTP4XoqK3V1R6PpZIiIp3gbXyCEQ9CkPvYhH8KDYXCu79b0T97BAy2DvJs85qvJCfds8oiNT1Wx0edLbl7YyTKmbawprNEbJ2c_vg/s1600/12.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3mHTAYqiIo8BtkJSXe1H_ab9Ef200f_dktJU-5TTTP4XoqK3V1R6PpZIiIp3gbXyCEQ9CkPvYhH8KDYXCu79b0T97BAy2DvJs85qvJCfds8oiNT1Wx0edLbl7YyTKmbawprNEbJ2c_vg/s400/12.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Several people died due to hunger in the Bhuvan valley tea garden in Assam</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br /><div class="pr_date" style="background-color: white; color: #666666; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; margin: 0px 0px 8px; outline: none; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Statement to mark the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty – 17 October 2012</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">15 October 2012</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">GENEVA – The United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty, Magdalena Sepúlveda, has called on States to take immediate measures to ensure access to justice by the poorest segments of society in a statement to mark the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">“Access to justice is a human right in itself, and essential for tackling the root causes of poverty,” said Ms. Sepúlveda, urging States to improve such access for the poor as a core part of their efforts to fight poverty. </span></div>
</span><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">“Without access to justice, people living in poverty are unable to claim and realize a whole range of human rights, or challenge crimes, abuses or violations committed against them,” Ms. Sepúlveda stressed. </span></div>
</span><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">People living in poverty face serious obstacles to accessing justice systems – including financial, social and physical barriers – which perpetuate and exacerbate their disadvantage.</span></div>
</span><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">“People living in poverty are often prevented from seeking justice due to the cost and time of travel to a distant courthouse, fees charged for filing claims or lack of free, quality legal assistance,” the Special Rapporteur said. “The poor may be denied legal standing to file a claim because they do not have an official birth certificate.”</span></div>
</span><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
“Lack of information about their rights, illiteracy or linguistic barriers, coupled with entrenched stigma attached to poverty, also makes it harder for the poor to engage with the justice system. In such circumstances, a person living in poverty cannot uphold their rights or challenge injustice,” she stressed.</div>
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</div>
</span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
Ms. Sepúlveda noted that even mature democracies struggle to ensure de facto equal access to justice by those living in poverty. “It is crucial to construct an inclusive justice system that is close to the people, both socially and geographically,” the independent expert said. </div>
</span></span><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">“Ensuring access to justice for the poor requires well-functioning judicial systems and laws that do not solely reflect the interests of wealthy and more powerful groups but also take into account income and power imbalances,” she said. “Reforms must be implemented with the effective and meaningful participation of persons living in poverty.” </span></div>
</span><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Ms. Sepúlveda emphasized that women living in poverty face particular difficulties in access to justice, and this is a major cause of their greater vulnerability to poverty. In her view, “efforts to tackle poverty must include empowering women to seek justice, and ensuring that the justice system does not discriminate against them.”</span></div>
</span><div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">“On the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty, I wish to remind States and others that efforts to end poverty must be multi-dimensional and sustainable. Improving access to justice is a crucial part of any strategy,” concluded Ms. Sepúlveda.</span></div>
</span><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">The Special Rapporteur’s 2012 report to the General Assembly, to be presented on 30 October 2012, examines the obstacles that persons living in poverty face in accessing justice. See the report:<a href="http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Poverty/A-67-278.pdf" style="color: #175ba1; outline: none; text-decoration: none;"><u style="outline: none;"><span style="color: blue; outline: none;">http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Poverty/A-67-278.pdf</span></u></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<i style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px; outline: none;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i style="outline: none;">Magdalena Sepúlveda was appointed as the Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights in May 2008 by the United Nations Human Rights Council. She is independent from any government or organization. Learn more, visit: </i><a href="http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Poverty/Pages/SRExtremePovertyIndex.aspx" style="color: #175ba1; outline: none; text-decoration: none;"><i style="outline: none;"><u style="outline: none;"><span style="color: blue; outline: none;">http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Poverty/Pages/SRExtremePovertyIndex.aspx</span></u></i></a></span></div>
</i><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i style="outline: none;">Check the Special Rapporteur’s “Guiding Principles on Human Rights and Extreme Poverty”:</i><a href="http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/HRCouncil/RegularSession/Session21/A-HRC-21-50_en.pdf" style="color: #175ba1; outline: none; text-decoration: none;"><u style="outline: none;"><span style="color: blue; outline: none;">http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/HRCouncil/RegularSession/Session21/A-HRC-21-50_en.pdf</span></u></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
</span><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i style="outline: none;">The Guiding Principles are also available in Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian and Spanish:</i><a href="http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Poverty/Pages/AnnualReports.aspx" style="color: #175ba1; outline: none; text-decoration: none;"><i style="outline: none;"><u style="outline: none;"><span style="color: blue; outline: none;">http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Poverty/Pages/AnnualReports.aspx</span></u></i></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
</span><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i style="outline: none;">For inquiries and </i><b style="outline: none;"><i style="outline: none;">media requests</i></b><i style="outline: none;">, please contact Lidia Rabinovich (+ 41 22 917 9763 /</i><a href="mailto:lrabinovich@ohchr.org" style="color: #175ba1; outline: none; text-decoration: none;"><i style="outline: none;"><u style="outline: none;"><span style="color: blue; outline: none;">lrabinovich@ohchr.org</span></u></i></a><i style="outline: none;"> or write to </i><a href="mailto:srextremepoverty@ohchr.org" style="color: #175ba1; outline: none; text-decoration: none;"><i style="outline: none;"><u style="outline: none;"><span style="color: blue; outline: none;">srextremepoverty@ohchr.org</span></u></i></a><i style="outline: none;">. </i></span></div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="outline: none;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
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For <b style="outline: none;">media inquiries</b> related to other UN independent experts:</div>
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Xabier Celaya, UN Human Rights – Media Unit (+ 41 22 917 9383 / <a href="mailto:xcelaya@ohchr.org" style="color: #175ba1; outline: none; text-decoration: none;"><u style="outline: none;"><span style="color: blue; outline: none;">xcelaya@ohchr.org</span></u></a>) </div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">HR12/263E </span></div>
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The statement is available at <a href="http://www.unog.ch/80256EDD006B9C2E/(httpNewsByYear_en)/A5DBA85166516D66C1257A98002F42CA?OpenDocument"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">http://www.unog.ch/80256EDD006B9C2E/(httpNewsByYear_en)/A5DBA85166516D66C1257A98002F42CA?OpenDocument</span></a></div>
RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-72621788200140327042012-10-09T23:43:00.001+05:302012-10-09T23:43:48.325+05:30Forced child marriage, slavery like reality in every single region of the world <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small; text-align: left;"><i>This is a Statement issued jointly* by a group of UN human rights experts to mark the first International Day of the Girl Child, Thursday 11 October 2012</i></span><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; text-align: left;"> </span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small; text-align: justify;">Every year an estimate of 10 million girls are married before they reach 18</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">GENEVA (11 October 2012) – “Girls who are forced to marry are committed to being in slavery like marriages for the rest of their lives. Girls who are victims of servile marriages experience domestic servitude, sexual slavery and suffer from violations to their right to health, education, non-discrimination and freedom from physical, psychological and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_violence" target="_blank">sexual violence</a>.</span><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span></div>
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Every year an estimate of 10 million girls are married before they reach 18. In the most appalling of these cases, little girls as young as eight years old are being married off to men who may be three or four times their age. </div>
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<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_marriage" target="_blank">Child marriage</a> cuts across countries, cultures, religions and ethnicities; 46% of girls under 18 are married in South Asia; 38% in sub-Saharan Africa; 29% in Latin America and the Caribbean; 18% in the Middle East and North Africa; and in some communities in Europe and North America too. </div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Child marriage is a violation of all the rights of the child. It forces children, particularly girls, to assume responsibilities for which they are often physically and psychologically not prepared for. </span><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Girls who are forced to marry face a life of violence in the home where they are physically and sexually abused, suffer from inhuman and degrading treatment and ultimately slavery.</span><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Early marriages also impacts on girls’ right to education, health, and participate in the decisions that affect them. Girls who marry early often drop out of school, significantly reducing their ability to gain skills and knowledge to make informed decisions and to earn an income. An obstacle to girls’ and women’s empowerment, it also hinders their ability to lift themselves out of poverty.</span><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Child brides are more likely to get pregnant at an early age and, as a result, face higher risk of maternal death and injury due to early sexual activity and childbearing.</span><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">A vast array of international instruments recognizes the right to free and full consent to marriage. In particular, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women states that the marriage of a child shall have no legal effect, and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, requires States parties to take all effective and appropriate measures with a view to abolishing practices that are harmful to children.</span><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Today, on the first United Nations International Day on the Girl Child, we call on States to increase the age of marriage to 18 years of age for girls and boys without exception and adopt urgent measures to prevent child marriage. As with all forms of slavery, forced early marriages should be criminalized. They cannot be justified on traditional, religious, cultural or economic grounds.</span><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">However, an approach which only focuses on criminalization cannot succeed in effectively combating forced early marriages. This should go hand in hand with public awareness raising campaigns to highlight the nature and harm caused by forced and early marriages and community programmes to help detect, provide advice, rehabilitation and shelter where necessary. In addition, birth registration should be made universal to support proof of age and prevent forced early marriage.</span><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">On this International Day of the Girl Child, we remind States of their obligation to promote and protect the rights of girls and that harmful practices against girls, including early and forced marriage should be put to an end, in accordance with international law.</span><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">No girl should be forced to marry. No girl should be committed to servile marriage, domestic servitude and sexual slavery. No girl should suffer from violations to their right to health, education, non-discrimination and freedom from physical, psychological and sexual violence. Not a single one.”</span><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small; text-align: justify;">Girls who are forced to marry are committed to being in slavery like marriages for the rest of their lives</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><b><i>(*) </i></b><i>This joint statement was issued by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, the UN Special Representative of the Secretary General on Violence against Children, the UN Special Rapporteur on Sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography, the UN Special Rapporteur on Contemporary forms of Slavery, including its causes and consequences, the UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women, the UN Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially women and children and the UN Working Group on Discrimination against Women in Law and Practice.</i></span><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><i>Report on servile marriages: </i></span><a href="http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fdaccess-dds-ny.un.org%2Fdoc%2FUNDOC%2FGEN%2FG12%2F151%2F67%2FPDF%2FG1215167.pdf%3FOpenElement&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNHMUE4nCDtOtYw7WhlU0dEoNC1NiQ" style="color: #0000cc; font-family: arial, sans-serif;" target="_blank"><span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><i><u>http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/<wbr></wbr>doc/UNDOC/GEN/G12/151/67/PDF/<wbr></wbr>G1215167.pdf?OpenElement</u></i></span></a><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><i>Check the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women: </i></span><a href="http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww2.ohchr.org%2Fenglish%2Flaw%2Fcedaw.htm&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNGQ3tcsOA5egwH1ScX1hJE0xlKbGA" style="color: #0000cc; font-family: arial, sans-serif;" target="_blank"><span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><i><u>http://www2.ohchr.org/english/<wbr></wbr>law/cedaw.htm</u></i></span></a><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><i>, a</i></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><i>nd the Convention on the Rights of the Child:</i></span><a href="http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww2.ohchr.org%2Fenglish%2Flaw%2Fcrc.htm&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNF-rO2CrI8t4pandPsU13x3iSYGvg" style="color: #0000cc; font-family: arial, sans-serif;" target="_blank"><span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><i><u>http://www2.ohchr.org/english/<wbr></wbr>law/crc.htm</u></i></span></a></div>
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RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-88533878070338204542012-10-01T08:16:00.000+05:302012-10-01T08:16:06.575+05:30Struggles in Assam<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Adivasis in Assam are struggling for schedued caste status for decades. But those of them who live in Barak valley only demand increase of their megre wages and giving them their other legal entitlements as tea plantation labourers so as they can save themselves from starvation and malnutrition deaths. Bengalis in Assam occasionally demand that those of them who are genuine Indian citizens should not be harassed and their right to use their language and to preserve culture should not be taken away. Bengali speaking Muslims sometimes feebly join their Hindu counterparts in their first demand, though their socio-economic condition is by no means better than the Adivasis (excepting that all non-Bodos living in Bodoland are demanding for scrapping or amending the Bodoland accord). A section of Assamese people is still fighting for a separate sovereign state of Assam independent of India. A section of Bodo community is also busy in armed struggle for their independent homeland while another group wants a Bodoland state independent of Assam but within India. All other small and big ethnic communties want separate states or autonomous homelands within Assam. The boundaries of demnaded homelands overlap to a great extent and the fight turns among themselves.</div>
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Except Bengali Hindus and Muslims and perhaps Adavasis, all communities are right now up against illegal Bangladeshis while the former groups in principle do not oppose this demand of expulsion of illegal foreigners but fear witch-hunt and therefore want their protection.</div>
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But all people of Assam in unision want the state of exception under the Armed Forces (Special Power) Act, 1958 has to be ended, projects of big river dams that jeopardise the livelihood and ecosystem must be crapped and, yes, all want the regime of corruption and impunity must be ended. </div>
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The energies of the people get nearly exshausted in sectarian struggles. People continue to fight among themselves and kill each others. State repression, elite and mafia (overground and underground) opression and corruption and loot by politicians and bureaucrats continue unabated while peace and progress keep elluding the state and people.</div>
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RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-47603139668047519702012-09-29T22:29:00.000+05:302012-10-09T06:39:54.224+05:30Assam: Vigilantism leads to riots<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Tension between communities was brewing in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assam" target="_blank">Assam</a> well before devastating ethnic violence in western part of the state erupted in July-August of 2012. The recent violence claimed about 93 lives excluding many other reported and unreported missing persons and rendered about 500,000 people homeless. It threatened the whole nation of a major flare-up when right wing Hindu political groups and Muslim fundamentalists tried to communalise it and spread it wherever they could. Muslims youths resorted to mayhem in Mumbai in the name of protest against this violence. Mindless campaigns over social media shot off to incite more violence by fanatics of both camps. People of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_East_India" target="_blank">North East India</a> working or studying in other parts of India felt threatened and fled for homes from some west and south Indian cities. </div>
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The tension that was brewing before was absolutely unrelated to what happened in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodoland" target="_blank">Bodoland</a> between people of Bengali speaking Muslim settlers and native Bodo tribe except that the Hindu Right tried hard to exploit the volatile situation to their advantage. </div>
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It is in the month of April when a sitting Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) of Assam Dr. Rumee Nath married a Muslim boy while her first marriage subsisted abandoning her 2 year old child that some vigilante groups activated themselves and did everything to polarise particularly the people living in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barak_Valley" target="_blank">Barak valley</a>, the southern part of Assam. They invoked love jihad and enforced several private curfews-- general strike enforced with coercion -- to mobilise people in religious lines. It led to violence in different places in the valley resulting in injuries of many persons and death of one and destruction of public properties.</div>
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Assam based human rights group <a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Barak Human Rights Protection Committee</a> (BHRPC) conducted a fact-finding study and issued <a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/2012/07/19/custodial-death-of-ajijur-rahman/" target="_blank">a report</a> about the situations and events on 19 July 2012. Though the report is focused on the death of Azizur Rahman in police custody, it also extensively deals with the building up of tensions that led to his death.</div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>BHRPC report on efforts of effecting communal division, riots and custodial death in the aftermath of “conversion and second marriage” of Dr Rumee Nath</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">An aged person named Mr Ajijur Rahman was picked up from his residence at Kalain under the Katigorah police station in the district of Cachar (Assam) by a raiding police team led by Mr Y T Gyatsu, a probationary Indian Police Service (IPS) officer posted as Additional Superintendent of Police at the Cachar police headquarters at Silchar in the night between 6 and 7 July 2012 and was tortured to death in the lock-up of Kalain police patrol post.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The police team was conducting raids to arrest some persons who were accused or suspects of creating mischief and rioting on and after 4 July in Kalain area. The law and order situation of the area deteriorated due to a call of general strike by the Hindu Jagaran Mancha in protest against alleged police harassment of youths belonging to their community who were suspected of being parts of the mob that assaulted Dr. Rumee Nath and her ‘husband’ on 29 June at Karimganj for her ‘conversion and marriage’ with the Muslim boy. The Mancha was also reportedly protesting against the protests of the supporters of Dr. Nath.</span></div>
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<strong><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The report:</span></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">After the incident the Barak Human Rights Protection Committee (BHRPC) formed a fact finding team comprising of 1. Mr. Neharul Ahmed Mazumder, 2. Mr Sadique Mohammed Laskar, 3. Mr Raju Barbhuiya, 4. Mr Nirmal Kumar Das, 5. Mr Aftabur Rahman Laskar, 6. Ms S Sarmila Singha and 7. Mr Abdul Wakil Choudhury to find out the factors and the situation that led to the death of Ajijur Rahman. The team visited Kalain area on 14 July and met family members and relatives of the victim, victims of rioting and their family and relatives and respectable citizens of the area including president, secretary and members of Kalain Bazaar committee Mr Sukhendu Kar, Mr Karunamoy Dey, Mr Asit Baran Deb and others. The fact finding team also visited the Kalain police patrol post and talked with the officer-in-charge Sub-Inspector of police Mr Anowar Hussain Choudhury and some constables. This report is based on the information collected by the team.</span></div>
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<strong><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The victim:</span></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The victim Mr Ajijur Rahman was aged about 60 years and a permanent resident of village Boroitoli Part-I, Kalain under Katigorah police station and was respected as a senior local businessman. The place, where his house situates, borders with three villages of Boroitoli, Brahmangram and Lakhipur. He was the head of his family which comprised of his 5 sons Mr Fariz Uddin (aged 42), Mr Sarif Uddin (39), Mr Selim Uddin (30), Mr Nazim Uddin (26), and Mr Mahim Uddin (20), 4 daughters Ms Anowara Begum (32), Ms Monowara Begum (aged 24 and unmarried), Ms Reena Begum (aged 18 and unmarried), Ms Runa Begum (aged 15 and unmarried), his wife Ms Saleha Khatun (55) his mother aged about 80 years and the children of his sons. It is a big joint family of people of three generations living together. It appeared that the family belongs to the emergent lower middle class of Bengali Muslims in Barak valley (South Assam).</span></div>
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<strong><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Place:</span></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Kalain is situated at a distance of about 40 kilometres from Silchar towards west and is a growing semi-urban area serving as a local business centre for the entire West Cachar region. The population of Bengali speaking Hinuds and Muslims are almost equal in number. Hindus have been living mostly nearby the market. Beside these two religious communities, some other people belonging to Manipuri, Bishnupria and Hindi speaking communities are also living in the outskirts. According to the local residents, people of Kalian belonging to different communities have been living harmoniously and in peace and love with each other for times immemorial. However, there were small quarrels and even fighting at times between people belonging to different communities but they were of personal nature and the religions of the parties have had nothing to with them.</span></div>
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<strong><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Incident:</span></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A huge police team led by Mr Y T Gyatsu raided the house of Mr Ajijur Rahman at about 12.30 in the night intervening between 6 and 7 July. They first cordoned off the house from all sides and then knocked at the doors. The inmates of the house were fast asleep. At the sound of heavy knocks Mr Ajijur Rahman got up and opened the door. A big number of police personnel including a lady constable remained outside the house and four/five of them including Mr Gyatsu went into the house. They asked for Mr Nazim Uddin who was not home at that time. In fact, no other male members of the family were present in the house since they were in hiding. The able male members of all families of the area were hiding themselves in apprehension of indiscriminate arrest and harassment by police in the wake of the rioting. As an aged person Mr Rahman did not feel the need to hide himself.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The police team made all female members to go out of the house and they conducted a search for Mr Nazim Uddin in all rooms including kitchen and bathrooms in vain. They demanded of Mr Ajijur Rahman to tell them the whereabouts of his son or they would send him in jail in place of his son. When he pleaded ignorance of whereabouts of his son Mr Gyatsu hurled a torrent of verbal abuse and started assaulting him. He demanded that Mr Rahman would have to take his son to the police patrol post before 6am. Mr Rahman told that he would not be able to do so since he did not know where his son is and latter’s mobile phone was also off. At that Mr Gyatsu started boxing his ears and the back of his head while dragging him. Member of the raiding police team constable Mr Badrul Islam Barbhuiya, Ms Reena Begum, daughter of Mr Rahman and other eye witnesses told the BHRPC team that Mr Gyatsu did not let the old man to wear even a top under garment. The old man cried and pleaded with Mr Gyatsu not to take him to the police station as he was to go to Mecca in Saudi Arabia for Haj pilgrimage. His wife and daughters also wept uncontrolably and urged the police officers to spare the old man at least for the sake of God since he did not know anything about incidents of 4 July. These beseeching of the helpless was not heeded.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mr. Mahibur Rahman<a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/Documents%20and%20Settings/admin/Desktop/Custodial%20death%20of%20Ajijur%20Rahman%20and%20the%20situation%20that%20led%20to%20his%20death.doc#_ftn1" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration: none;" title="">[1]</a>, a neighbour and cousin of Mr Ajijur Rahmn, told the BHRPC team that when he heard of the cries of wife and daughters of the latter he went there and saw that the police was taking him with them. He then sneaked to house of other neighbours Mr. Taj Uddin<a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/Documents%20and%20Settings/admin/Desktop/Custodial%20death%20of%20Ajijur%20Rahman%20and%20the%20situation%20that%20led%20to%20his%20death.doc#_ftn2" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration: none;" title="">[2]</a> and Mr. Shahid Uddin<a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/Documents%20and%20Settings/admin/Desktop/Custodial%20death%20of%20Ajijur%20Rahman%20and%20the%20situation%20that%20led%20to%20his%20death.doc#_ftn3" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration: none;" title="">[3]</a> and awakened them. They were to move silently since they were themselves very afraid of the police and a prohibitory order under section 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code, 1973 was also in force. Three of them stood at the front side of a house<a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/Documents%20and%20Settings/admin/Desktop/Custodial%20death%20of%20Ajijur%20Rahman%20and%20the%20situation%20that%20led%20to%20his%20death.doc#_ftn4" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration: none;" title="">[4]</a> at a distance of about 20 metres from the patrol post to witness what was happening to the old man there. According to them, from that place everything was clearly visible since the doors and windows of the patrol post house were wide open and electric lights were on. They stated that they saw Mr Ajijur Rahman was seated on a red plastic chair. They inferred from the gestures of the police personnel and Mr Rahman that they were talking. Then two personnel coming from two sides kept his thighs in tight grip in a way that rendered Mr Rahman unable to move. And then another police personnel dressed like a higher officer and in his facial and physical features resembling to a tribal man came and placing his one grip at the chin and another on the head twisted the head of Mr Ajijur Rahman with tremendous force. It seemed that the body of Mr Rahman became motionless and loose and his head leaned at the side at which his head was left by the officer. This is also corroborated by Mr Taj Uddin and Mr Shahid Uddin.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">According to the police personnel posted at the Kalain patrol post with whom the BHRPC team talked, there were two police officers there at the time who more or less look like tribals. One is Mr Y T Gaytsu and another is Mr L Saikia, the Deputy Superintendent of Police. It appears that the person who twisted the head of Mr Ajijur Rahman is either Mr Gyatsu or Mr Saikia.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">According to the above mentioned eye witnesses, after the assault of the officer all people in the patrol post got agitated and a hullabaloo ensued. Two personnel lifted Mr Ajijur Rahman as if they were lifting a dead body and put him in a vehicle which then went away. It was at about 2am.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mr. Mahibur Rahman further stated that a certain person named Mr AJijur Rahman Khan called him up on his cell phone and informed that a person of his name from Boroitoli was brought to the Kalain Community Health Centre and the physician in-charge of the hospital Dr Sumon Bhomik advised to take him to the Silchar Medical College and Hospital as he could not feel his pulse. Circumstances strongly indicate that Mr Ajijur Rahman was brought dead and he died due to twisting of his head.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">After that the family, relatives and neighbours of Mr Ajijur Rahman tried to find out what happened to him during the remainder of the night and in the morning some of them went to the SMCH and came to know about the death of Mr Rahman with help from local member of Assam Legislative Assembly Mr Ataur Rahman Mazarbhuiya. Autopsy of the body was conducted at the SMCH on 7 July and was handed over to the relatives of the deceased. After performing last rites Mr. Ajijur Rahman was laid to rest on the next day.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The local people were concerned that the post mortem report might not reflect the true causes of death and material facts might be suppressed since the autopsy in India is conducted in a very unscientific, legally improper and unreliable way. Usually someone engaged in manual scavenging cuts the body at the direction of a surgeon who stands at a safe distance and looks at the body from there. The surgeon does not touch the body or examine it otherwise. From that distance he makes a guess and writes down the cause of death based on the guess. In cases of custodial deaths the body remains under the custody and absolute control of the police since before the death until the autopsy report is prepared.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Observing such appalling conditions of autopsy procedure the National Human Rights Commission of India issued guidelines to the states as well as the central government calling for their immediate action to address the lack of transparency while dealing with deaths in custody. The Commission recommended video recording of the inquest as well as the post-mortem of the victim. The Commission has even recommended using a standardised ‘post-mortem examination report form’ by the forensic surgeons. These recommendations however have not been implemented in India in their letter and spirit. Sometimes the procedures may be recorded but the report is not prepared as per the recommended guidelines.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Sharing the concerns of the local people the BHRPC instantaneously on 7 July wrote a letter to the District Magistrate, Superintendent of Police and Superintendent of the SMCH enclosing the NHRC guidelines and urging them to conduct the autopsy as per the guidelines.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The DM also ordered an inquiry into the incident of death to be conducted an executive magistrate. People are of the opinion that it is nothing but an attempt to cover up the case and save the guilty officers and personnel. Executive magistrates are not independent judicial authorities. They are servants of the government and exercise quasi-judicial powers. They usually do not record evidence before the other parties and give parties opportunity to cross-examine the witnesses of the other party in violations of universally recognised rules of judicial procedure. There are reasons, therefore, to believe that their inquiry may not be objective and impartial.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Parliament of India keeping in view of the lacunae in law regarding inquiry into the deaths in police custody incorporated a subsection (1A) in section 176 of the Criminal Procedure Code, 1973 by section 18 (ii) of the Criminal Procedure Code (Amendment) Act, 2005 providing for an inquiry by a judicial magistrate in addition to the inquiry or investigation held by the police. Although the BHRPC reminded the DM of this mandatory provision it was ignored.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The widow of late Ajijur Rahman filed a complaint at the court of Chief Judicial Magistrate, Cachar on 7 July 2012 under section 302, 506 and 34 of the IPC against Mr Y T Gyatsu and other police personnel. The complaint was sent to the Katigorah Police Station for registration and investigation. It was registered and assigned a case number vide Katigorah PS Case No. 291/12. The Officer-in-Charge of the police station entrusted a Sub-Inspector of police with the task of investigation. There are reasons to suspect the objectivity and impartiality of the investigation officer because he is working under the very persons who have been named as accused in the case.</span></div>
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<strong><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Background:</span></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As mentioned above, the police team that picked up Mr Ajijur Rahman was conducting raids to arrest some persons who were accused or suspects of creating mischief and rioting on and after 4 July in Kalain area. The law and order situation of the area deteriorated due to a call of general strike by the Hindu Jagaran Mancha in protest against alleged police harassment of youths belonging to their community who were suspected of being parts of the mob that assaulted and brutally beaten up Dr. Rumee Nath and her ‘husband’ on 29 June at Karimganj for her ‘conversion and marriage’ with the Muslim boy. The Mancha was also reportedly protesting against the protests of the supporters of Dr. Nath.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">After the call of “<em>bandh</em>” (strike) on 4 July was given by the Mancha some groups in different areas of Barak valley issued a counter call to the people not to observe the <em>bandh</em> because, according to them, frequent strikes are harmful for the business and economy. These groups are thought to be the supporters of Dr Nath. In the morning of 4 July activists of the Mancha went to different parts of the valley to enforce the strike. One of such groups came to Kalain bazaar where they faced resistance from others who wanted the market to function normally.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The bazaar committee, a committee of shop keepers having shops at Kalain, intervened and a tripartite meeting was held among the opposers and supporters of <em>bandh</em> and the committee. The committee offered a compromise proposal after talk with both the parties that the shops could remain closed till 12 noon and then the shops could be opened. Though there were indications of acceptance by both the parties but it could not be finalised as some people of both the parties were adamant in their stands. The members of the committee went to their homes giving up hope of any settlement.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">According to the information gathered by the BHRPC, after break down of talks when supporters of the bandh were trying to enforce it forcibly the police raised a barricade and kept most of them outside the barricade. However, they were trying to break the barricade unsuccessfully. With times the situation became very tense. At about 11.30am a mob of Muslim youths came with bamboo sticks and attacked anyone belonging to Hindu communities including shop-keepers and members of the bazaar committee. To face the attack many youths of Hindu communities also came out with sticks. A fight between the communities ensued. Stones were pelted from both sides. Some cycles and motor cycles were burnt down. About 18 people were wounded. They were 1. Mr Sunil Mandal, 2. Mr Sushil Deb, 3. Mr Sumon Deb, 4. Mr Pronit Deb, 5. Mr Sukhendu Kar, 6. Mr Jamal Uddin, 7. Mr Deepak Podder, 8. Mr Titu Baishnob, 9. Mr Buddha Deb Roy, 10. Mr Manna Deb, 11. Mr Sumit Shulkabaidhya, 12. Mr Badrul Islam Barbhuiya, 13. Mr Ranjit Deb, 14. Mr Khalil Uddin, 15, Mr Moin Uddin, 16. Mr Kamrul Haque, 17. Mr Debabrata Paul, 18. Mr Monsur Uddin and others. First six persons sustained serious injuries. Three reporters who went there to cover the situation were also caught in the fight between two communities and received injuries.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">According to the local people, had the administration handled it efficiently the situation could be brought under control and the fighting and resulting injuries could have been averted. Executive magistrate Ms Khaleda Sultana Ahmed, DSP (probationary) Mr Iftikar Ali and in-charge of Kalain police patrol post Mr Anowar Hussain Choudhury were present. They failed to handle the mob frenzy. People felt they could take measures including lathi charge and tear gas fire. These measures could disperse the mob. Due to the inability of the authorities to take decisions the fighting intensified.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Towards the evening Additional District Magistrate Mr Borenya Das went to Kalain with a force of Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and ordered the police to charge the mob with sticks and fire of tear gas. The mob then got dispersed. The district administration then issued a prohibitory order under section 144 of the CrPC. The situation slowly came under control.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The police registered cases against many named and unnamed suspects who were accused of involvement in fighting on 4 July and started conducting raids of the houses of the people living there to arrest the suspects. It was one of such raids during which Mr Ajijur Rahman was picked up by the police and tortured him to death.</span></div>
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<strong><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Controversy over ‘conversion and marriage’:</span></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Apart from the mob hysteria that drove the mobs of both communities at that moment, this communal clash resulted from efforts of communalisation of ‘conversion and second marriage’ of Dr. Rumee Nath, encouragement and provocation of youths by a minister of Assam government to take law in their hands and beat up anyone who enters into inter-religious marriage.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Dr. Nath is a Member of Legislative Assembly of Assam (MLA) elected from Borkhola constituency in Cachar district holding ticket from the Congress party. She was earlier also elected from the same constituency as a candidate of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from which she later defected. She has been married with Mr. Rakesh Singh of Lucknow of Uttar Pradesh and from him she has a girl child who is about 2 years old. It was reported that their matrimonial relation has not been going well for some months.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In the month of April she reportedly got ‘converted into Islamic religion’ and ‘married’ one Jakir Hussain (also known as Jakey) of Badarpur under Karimganj district apparently as per Islamic rules. However, it is reported that the ‘conversion and marriage’ took place in the same sitting. Many Muslim clerics maintained that the marriage was invalid for it was solemnised before observing <em>iddat</em>period of three months and therefore her first marriage was subsisting. Validity of her conversion was also under question mark as it was tainted with motives that were not entirely pious. Most intellectuals of the valley also did not take her ‘conversion and second marriage’ pleasantly. According to them, her actions were immature, improper and not befitting of a public figure.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Her first husband filed a case against her and her ‘second husband’ under section 494, 497, 498 and others of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 accusing her of bigamy, (accusing her second husband of) adultery, enticing or taking away or detaining with criminal intent a married woman. She also filed case against her first husband alleging domestic violence.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The BHRPC maintained that right to get converted into any religion is a part of the freedom of conscience and free profession, practice and propagation of religion guaranteed by Article 25 of the constitution of India. <em>Per se</em> inter-religious and inter-caste marriages are also recognised by the Special Marriage Act, 1955 and such marriage should be encouraged as they can promote harmonious communal co-existence and secularism. However, in case of Dr. Nath the things are a little different. She was a married woman with a two years old child. Bigamy or living with another person as man and wife during the subsistence of earlier marriage<em>prima facie</em> amount to offence against the institution of marriage. Abandoning a 2 year old child is cruelty on the child and violation of child rights. These grievances against her could be legitimately vented through legal means and judicial process and which was what her first husband resorted to.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">However, some groups including the Hindu Jagaran Mancha exerted themselves to blow it out of all proportion. They conjured up spectre of ‘love jihad’ and started campaign against inter-religious and inter-caste marriages, friendship between girls and boys belonging to different communities and even resorted to vigilantism by raiding parks, restaurants and other public places in search of inter-religious couples and friends and beating them up. Ostensibly this group received encouragement from political leaders who were interested in diving people in religious lines and diverting the attention of the people from the real issues of starvation deaths, corruption, miserable conditions of rural and urban roads and the national highways, human rights violations by police and armed forces etc.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A very influential politician of the ruling congress party in Assam Mr Gautom Roy, Minister for Public Health and Engineering (PHE), at a public function organised to mark 3 years of Assam government issued a call to the public to beat up any boy who marries a girl from a different community and to hand over the girl to her guardians. Provoked and encouraged by this call a mob of more than one hundred youths attacked Dr Nath and her ‘second husband’ at about 10pm on 29 June 2012 at Hotel Nakshatra in Karimganj where she was staying for the night after visiting her constituency. Both of them were brutally assaulted, and according to her, attempts were also made to rape her. After hours a police team rescued them in serious conditions. They were rushed to Guwahati for treatment.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The BHRPC could not confirm any direct links of the minister with the attack on Dr Nath and the mob that attacked her. But it is obvious that his call to beat up such couples definitely encouraged the mob. The comment of the minister is not only against the established constitutional canons of the land and principles of human rights but also a provocation to breach the public order and a call towards further lawlessness and jungle raj. Any person including a minister may disagree with any law and in such cases he should propose repeal or amendment of the law if he is sincere in his opinions. A minister who is part of the party that rules at the central and state governments should have proposed amendment of Article 14, 21 and 25 of the constitution and the Special Marriage Act, 1955 if he sincerely thought that conversion and inter-religious marriages are undesirable. By provoking youths he betrayed his motives.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The attack on Dr Nath is a manifestation of desperate reactions of patriarchy and its interests against the empowerment of women and empowered women. These are attacks on expression of moral agency in women. She was abused and attacked only because she was a woman.</span></div>
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<strong><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Conclusion:</span></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is found that Mr Ajijur Rahman was the latest victim of inhumanity and brutality of the police which they sometimes without any rhymes and reasons unleash on the very people for whose protection they are being paid. His son Mr Nazim Uddin might be an accused or suspect and his arrest might also be necessary in the situation. But it is absolutely illegal to take his father into custody to be used as bait for the son. Moreover, the torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment to which he was subjected and which allegedly caused his death are not only illegal but also inhuman and barbarous.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is also found that groups of people who have vested interest in communal divisions among the people created controversy around ‘conversion and second marriage’ of Dr Rumee Nath and engaged in a communal campaign. It polarised some people in religious lines and created tensions in Barak valley.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Provocative and ant-constitutional statement of Minister Gautom Roy encouraged the mob of the male dominated society to attack Dr Nath, a woman who represents more than 1 million people in the law-making body of the state and her ‘second husband’.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The alleged police harassment of youths and inefficient investigation of the attack case and efforts of forcible enforcement of strikes led to the fighting between the communities at Kalain; communal mass hysteria of some Muslims youths of Kalain and inefficient handling of the situation by the authorities present there led to the fighting between the communities resulting in injuries of many innocent people; insensitivity to human rights of the people and reliance on illegal means and torture during investigation by the police resulted in the death of Mr Ajijur Rahman.</span></div>
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<strong><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Recommendations:</span></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The BHRPC recommends to the authorities including the Central government of India and government of Assam to take following actions:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To the Government of Assam:</span></div>
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<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To conduct a prompt and objective judicial inquiry into the death of Ajijur Rahman and the circumstances that led to his death;</span></li>
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<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To cause the investigation of the case of custodial death of Mr Ajijur Rahman to be conducted by a team led by an officer of the rank of Superintendent of Police of the Crime Investigation Department of Assam police;</span></li>
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<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To pay an ex-gratia of an adequate amount to the next of kin of Mr Ajijur Rahman;</span></li>
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<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To hand over the investigation of mob attack on Dr Rumee Nath to the Central Bureau of Investigation of Delhi Police as name of a minister of Assam government is involved in the incident;</span></li>
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<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To amend the Assam Police Act, 2007 to bring it in conformity with the directions of the Supreme Court of India in Prakash Singh and others Vs. Union of India and others case;</span></li>
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<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To separate investigation wing and maintenance of law and order wing of Assam police completely;</span></li>
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<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To train the officers and other personnel of Assam police in following human rights laws while tackling riots and dealing with mobs; and</span></li>
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<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To take any other actions needed for protection of human rights of the people.</span></li>
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<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To ensure a prompt and impartial inquiry by a judicial authority into the death of Ajijur Rahman, communal fighting and mob attack on Dr. Rumee Nath;</span></li>
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<ol start="2" style="color: #333333; line-height: 16.78333282470703px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 35px;">
<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To ensure that the investigation of the case of custodial death of Mr Ajijur Rahman is conducted by a team led by an officer of rank of Superintendent of Police of the Crime Investigation Department of Assam police;</span></li>
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<ol start="3" style="color: #333333; line-height: 16.78333282470703px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 35px;">
<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To ensure payment of ex-gratia of an adequate amount to the next of kin of Mr Ajijur Rahman;</span></li>
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<ol start="4" style="color: #333333; line-height: 16.78333282470703px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 35px;">
<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To ensure the investigation of mob attack on Dr Rumee Nath to the Central Bureau of Investigation of Delhi Police as name of a minister of Assam government is involved in the incident;</span></li>
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<ol start="5" style="color: #333333; line-height: 16.78333282470703px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 35px;">
<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To repeal the colonial Police Act of 1861 and enact a police act as per directions of the Supreme Court of India issued in Prakash Singh and others Vs. Union of India and others case;</span></li>
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<ol start="6" style="color: #333333; line-height: 16.78333282470703px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 35px;">
<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To enact the Communal Violence Bill after further consultation with the civil society;</span></li>
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<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To enact the Prevention of Torture Bill after further consultation with civil society;</span></li>
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<ol start="8" style="color: #333333; line-height: 16.78333282470703px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 35px;">
<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To enact a law providing for adequate reparation and rehabilitation of the victims of human rights violations by the state agencies and their families after consultation with the civil society; and</span></li>
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<li style="list-style: decimal outside; margin: 7px 0px 8px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To take any other appropriate actions required for protection of human rights of the people.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To the Central Government of India:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/Documents%20and%20Settings/admin/Desktop/Custodial%20death%20of%20Ajijur%20Rahman%20and%20the%20situation%20that%20led%20to%20his%20death.doc#_ftnref1" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration: none;" title="">[1]</a> Mr. Mahibur Rahman, aged about 50, son of Haji Haroos Ali, resident of Lakhipur Part-I, Kalain, Katigorah, Cachar.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/Documents%20and%20Settings/admin/Desktop/Custodial%20death%20of%20Ajijur%20Rahman%20and%20the%20situation%20that%20led%20to%20his%20death.doc#_ftnref2" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration: none;" title="">[2]</a> Mr. Taj Uddin, aged about 44, son of late Abdul Barik of Boroitoli Part-I</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/Documents%20and%20Settings/admin/Desktop/Custodial%20death%20of%20Ajijur%20Rahman%20and%20the%20situation%20that%20led%20to%20his%20death.doc#_ftnref3" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration: none;" title="">[3]</a> Mr Shahid Uddin, aged about 25, son of late Abdul Wahab Barbhiuya of Brahmangram.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/Documents%20and%20Settings/admin/Desktop/Custodial%20death%20of%20Ajijur%20Rahman%20and%20the%20situation%20that%20led%20to%20his%20death.doc#_ftnref4" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration: none;" title="">[4]</a> The house belongs to one Mr Mainul Haque. They did not awake him lest the police know about any movements.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The report is also available at <a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/2012/07/19/custodial-death-of-ajijur-rahman/" style="text-align: left;">http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/2012/07/19/custodial-death-of-ajijur-rahman/</a></span></div>
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RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-16296450487166583752012-09-11T22:26:00.000+05:302012-09-29T21:32:08.360+05:30 Assam violence: Sentencing victims to statelessness and starvation<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="text-align: justify;">Waliullah Ahmed Laskar* </span></div>
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<span style="text-align: justify;">An estimated 1, 50,000 persons out of about 5, 00, 000 who have been rendered homeless in the recent ethnic clash in Western Assam districts, where 95 persons died and many disappeared and sustained injuries and loss of properties, are yet to be rehabilitated.</span></div>
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As one side of the conflict and dominant political groups in the state are clamouring for not rehabilitating them claiming that they are Bangladeshi infiltrators, the government has deiced to rehabilitate only those displaced people who has land documents. Till now such documents of only 11,066 families out of estimated 1,50,000 persons have been verified and reportedly found genuine and will be rehabilitated in 15-30 days.</div>
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It seems the government is committing grave injustice under sectarian pressure because the claims of these groups do not stand facts and figures. Sanjoy Hazarika, Director, Centre for North East Studies, Jamia Millia Islamia, that organised a seminar on the issue, said that immigration was a movement of labour force, and that there was “no great conspiracy” behind it as alleged by some groups. People move where they find work, he said.</div>
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There were large scale movements of people from other states of undivided <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">India</st1:country> such as Bengal and Bihar in <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Assam</st1:country> during colonial period. After partition in 1947, although the movement has not stopped, number of the immigrants reduced to a great extent and reasons of immigration and the religion of the immigrants changed, at least to some degree. Most of the immigrants in post independence periods are Hindus fleeing for fear of persecution in <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Bangladesh</st1:country>. After the Indira-Mujib treaty of 1971 their numbers have also drastically come down as revealed in the census reports.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
According to the Economic Survey of Assam 2011-12 released by the Government of Assam, growth of population in the state during 1971-2011 is 113.12 against the national growth rate of 120.77 during this period. If there is huge influx from <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Bangladesh</st1:country> in <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Assam</st1:country> then how come the national growth rate is higher? Is there a bigger influx in all other states also?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Birth rate among Muslims in <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Assam</st1:country> is comparatively high as the literacy rate is low and there is also some out-migration (though not very significant) of non-Bengalis of <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Assam</st1:country> in recent decades. It explains the marginal growth in percentage of the Bengali Muslim population.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh60bMegtHJUxKVg2GnbZUg-OjGoaTxrpWhM-eHEuIybpcgNN5sN4AAqlVZ4E90DkbEDrwliu1p0WwXDC2lNygR9iC7jn0im-9nQinuflW09O21AVdNulbRc4VjO9JzKM_8u2QRz-DCM6M/s1600/ibtimes.+com.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh60bMegtHJUxKVg2GnbZUg-OjGoaTxrpWhM-eHEuIybpcgNN5sN4AAqlVZ4E90DkbEDrwliu1p0WwXDC2lNygR9iC7jn0im-9nQinuflW09O21AVdNulbRc4VjO9JzKM_8u2QRz-DCM6M/s320/ibtimes.+com.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A group of displaced vioence victims</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
However, still there is some movement of people from across the border. It is, as Mr Hazarika says, a movement of labour force, and that there is “no great conspiracy” behind it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Now, if the Indian state decide to expel them without paying attention to the economic consequences as a sovereign state it has right to do so. But it certainly does not have the right to deprive all Bengali speaking Muslims of their citizenship and make them non-citizen subjects or render them stateless.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Due to conflation of legal and illegal migrants in the public discourse, arbitrary procedure of detection of foreigners and misuse of powers by the biased officials the bonafide citizens do not trust any move to expulsion of illegal immigrants and they put some resistance.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Even the regular procedure of detection and deportation, which the state has done away with in this case, is not consistent with the human rights norms and international law. The detection is being done by state government officials acting as election officers under the election commission of <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">India</st1:country> and state police. In practice they do not follow any rules and based on information received from some non-official local persons, who work as personal informers to them, the election officials mark name of the concerned person with D (standing for doubtful) in the electoral rolls and/or police officers make reference to the foreigners tribunals. In both cases the concerned person is not informed and given an opportunity of being heard. Community leaders and rights activists say in most of the cases allegations are made against the concerned person to settle personal scores. According to them, this is the reasons for as low conviction rates as only about 6% in such cases so far. Marking D in name of a voter suspends his all citizenship rights for indefinite time and now about 150 thousand names in the electoral rolls are marked with D in the state.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Many people are detained in camps maintained for the purpose in inhuman condition after their name is marked with D in the voters list or a reference is made to the tribunal for the period of pendency of the trial which is indefinite in violations of Article 21 of the Constitution of India which says that no person shall be deprived of his life and personal liberty except in accordance with procedure established by law. The procedure of tagging names with D is nowhere established by law and arbitrarily making reference also contravenes due process principle.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The foreigners tribunals work under the Foreigners Act, 1946 and this law, in a fundamental departure from liberal jurisprudence, reverses the burden of proof (Sec. 9) and places the onus upon the person concerned to prove his citizenship. It thus replaces the cardinal judicial principle of presumption of innocence. Moreover, in many cases the tribunals do not even hear the accused and pass ex-parte orders declaring him a foreigner. It happens mostly in cases where the accused do not receive notice issued by the tribunal or can not hire a lawyer to represent him owing to his homelessness or indigent condition, as the case may be. There is also no provision for appeal in the Act.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The process of deportation also violates international law relating to human rights and diplomatic protocols. It is described as follows: “When the people are forced across the border, all their possessions are taken away, along with any signs that may point to their Indian origin. They are warned that if they turn back, they will be shot as infiltrators. As parting advice, they are also cautioned to tell the Bangladeshi Rifles, if they are caught across the border that they are returning from some work or wedding from a particular village. Thus poor people, deliberately bereft of identity and citizenship, have no option but to again take the path of illegality merely in order to survive.” Diplomatic protocols (under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, 1961) require that when deportation takes place the embassy or high commission or any other representative of the state of the country of origin of the deportee be informed about the decision. This is never done in cases of deportation of supposed Bangladeshis. The extra-legal process followed by India effectively renders the people involved stateless and violates Article 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948 (UDHR), particularly clause 2 which says: no one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality ...</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
As a result the issue remains alive and every now and then plunges the people into mindless violence. <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Assam</st1:country> movement of 1979-85 that claimed thousands of lives including Nellie massacre of 1983 is an example. It also gives the politicians easy way of emotionally blackmailing both the sides. It has perpetually been hanging over the heads of both the sides like "the Sword of Damocles" leaning more towards Bengali speaking Muslims making them vulnerable to everything from linguistic, cultural and political dominance to making them weaker in the bargaining in labour market.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Now the government has deiced to rehabilitated only those displaced people who have land documents. Till now such documents of only 11,066 families out of an estimated 1,50,000 persons have been verified and reportedly found genuine. These families will hopefully be rehabilitated in 15-30 days. But this illegal step of measuring victimhood and sufferings as well as citizenship and entitlement of basic human rights on the land held by the person is unconstitutional and bereft of human compassion and moral compunction. The move will sentence most of the victims to statelessness and starvation since almost all of the victims are illiterate and landless labourers.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Regarding foreigners issue in <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Assam</st1:country> in reference to rehabilitation of the victims of Bodoland violence the points given below may be considered:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
1. There is no dispute that victims living in relief camps are victims of the violence whether they are Indians or not.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
2. There is also no dispute that they are human beings and as such they have basic human rights to which they are entitled irrespective of their nationality.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
4. One of the parties to the conflict has alleged that some of the victims of the other party may not be Indian nationals.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
5. There are reasons to hold that they all can not be Bangladeshis.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
6. Point 5 necessitates detection of their nationality under such a procedure which is fair and is not harassing to the bonafide citizens.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Now what can be done in such a situation:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
1. Acknowledge their victimhood. It entails rehabilitation and reparation.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
2. Do not violate their human rights. It entails protection of life and dignity.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
3. Detect Bangladeshis among them without harassing any bonafide citizens taking advantage of their victimhood, illiteracy and poverty.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
4. After detection decide whether the labour force provided by them is needed and beneficial or not for <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Assam</st1:country> and weigh the gain or loss of deporting or retaining them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
5. If you decide to retain them document them and devise a regime where there basic rights are not violated.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
6. In case you decide to deport them to their country do it under a process that actually works.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
To really and actually deport them you have to do:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
1. Dont conflate legal migrants who are bonafide citizens with illegal ones and take into confidence the former so they dont resist any move and it does not end up becoming a hot political issue.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
2. Talk with <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Bangladesh</st1:country> and evolve a procedure of detection and deportation to which both the parties are agreeable. Otherwise <st1:place w:st="on">Bangladesh</st1:place> will not admit that the person is its national and will resist any deportation. No country can forcibly push back any person into any other country. It is not practical.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
3. Finally, actually deport them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
All other steps will perhaps not succeed to serve the purpose and will make more people victimised, society polarized, peace further jeopardized and some politicians will reap some votes and nothing more will happen except more corruption and more bloodbath.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
*Writer is Director (Legal Affairs), Barak Human Rights Protection Committee (BHRPC), <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Silchar</st1:city>, <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Assam</st1:country></st1:place></div>
</div>
</div>
RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0Assam, India26.2006043 92.937573922.5556238 87.8838629 29.845584799999997 97.991284900000011tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-56351213357852428112012-06-19T21:04:00.000+05:302012-10-09T06:42:28.485+05:30Assam: Human rights and detection and deportation of foreigners <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: white;">Taking serious note of the
failure of the government machinery to detect and deport illegal Bangladeshi
migrants from </span><st1:country -region="-region" style="background-color: white;" w:st="on">Assam</st1:country><span style="background-color: white;">
even after determination of their citizenship status through
the legal process, the Gauhati High Court has asked the State and Union
governments to clarify how such cases should be dealt with.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibCjAyapWtgKoh6fjX3vOJIVhSQ6L8qzw13XwZtf2X1B5Zxrjrg1X4VqZpHRDPjkpw0N9L2hyphenhyphenc6hDtLMaxTi8BwY76b3opyCdXw11FNqFlZr20Pu0-fF2Wta6q8mq8GwBUQLdmptnh8wE/s1600/Gauhati+High+Court.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibCjAyapWtgKoh6fjX3vOJIVhSQ6L8qzw13XwZtf2X1B5Zxrjrg1X4VqZpHRDPjkpw0N9L2hyphenhyphenc6hDtLMaxTi8BwY76b3opyCdXw11FNqFlZr20Pu0-fF2Wta6q8mq8GwBUQLdmptnh8wE/s1600/Gauhati+High+Court.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gauhati High Court at Guwahati, Assam</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
“The <st1:place w:st="on">Union</st1:place>
and State governments in respective Home departments are directed to clarify in
case of failure to deport the declared foreign nationals to their country of
origin, how their cases will be dealt with. The authorities in the State and
the Union Government shall bear in mind that more than 40 years have gone by
since the cut-off date, i.e., 25.3.1971 was fixed for detection and deportation
of foreign national (illegal Bangladeshi migrants),”Justice B K Sharma said in
his order in connection with cases WP (C) No. 4601/2011 and WP (C) No.
642/2009. This is <a href="http://www.assamtribune.com/scripts/detailsnew.asp?id=jun1912/at05">reported
in the Assam Tribune</a> on 19 June 2012.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
It is true that the attitude of
both the governments is indifferent to the problems of deportation of the
illegal immigrants living in <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Assam</st1:country>.
The indifference and insensitivity has led to a situation where laws and rules
governing the process are vague, inadequate and inefficacious. It, in turn, has created a de facto and
de jure regime which coupled with the
prejudices of the implementing officials facilitates witch-hunting of people
belonging to a particular linguistic community living for centuries in Assam
while failing to detect any actual foreign national and deport her/him legally
to the country of her/his origin. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The processes of detection,
detention and deportation of ‘foreign nationals’ being applied in Assam not
only violate international law and human rights of the suspects but also
threaten about 2 million people with being rendered stateless. This is due to
many factors including the presumption that anyone in the state who speak the
Bengali language and belong to the poorer strata are an enemy aliens and a member of the troops of cultural
aggression of <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Assam</st1:country> by <st1:place w:st="on">Bangladesh</st1:place>.
They do not deserve any rights and can be rightfully deprived of their human
rights. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The detection is being done by
state government officials acting as election officers under the election
commission of <st1:place w:st="on">India</st1:place>
and state police. In practice they do not follow any rules and based on
information received from some non-official local persons, who work as personal
informers to them, the election officials mark name of the concerned person
with D (standing for doubtful) and/or police officers make reference to the
foreigners tribunals. In both cases the concerned person is not informed and
given an opportunity of being heard. Community leaders and rights activists say
in most of the cases allegations are made against the concerned person to
settle personal scores. According to them, this is the reasons for as low
conviction rates as only 6% in such cases so far. Marking D in name of a voter
suspends his all citizenship rights for indefinite time and now about 200
thousand names in the electoral rolls are marked with D in the state.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Many people are detained in camps
maintained for the purpose in inhuman condition after their name is marked with
D in the voters list or a reference is made to the tribunal for the period of
pendency of the trial which is indefinite in violations of Article 21 of the
Constitution of India which says that no person shall be deprived of his life
and personal liberty except in accordance with procedure established by law.
The procedure of tagging names with D is nowhere established by law and
arbitrarily making reference also contravenes due process principle.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The foreigners tribunals works
under the Foreigners Act, 1946 and this law, in a fundamental departure from
liberal jurisprudence, reverses the burden of proof (Sec. 9) and places the
onus upon the person concerned to prove his citizenship. It thus replaces the
cardinal judicial principle of presumption of innocence. Moreover, in many
cases the tribunals do not even hear the accused and pass ex-parte orders
declaring him a foreigner. It happens mostly in cases where the accused do not
receive notice issued by the tribunal or can not hire a lawyer to represent him
owing to his homelessness or indigent condition, as the case may be. There is also no provision for appeal in the
Act.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlaNJAV6ywhBDksGd8tWmbGOOvnhCuRiKVuYjFNj3dMrZSzXZBcVAXcg9kWRWIs5M6Ujp05488rphcgn6vnOGlqK5U8ALPLAl-gJD90ce3XDhasBumR2kjUPyAhusH3YNFB5YL9HfV524/s1600/assam-political-map.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlaNJAV6ywhBDksGd8tWmbGOOvnhCuRiKVuYjFNj3dMrZSzXZBcVAXcg9kWRWIs5M6Ujp05488rphcgn6vnOGlqK5U8ALPLAl-gJD90ce3XDhasBumR2kjUPyAhusH3YNFB5YL9HfV524/s1600/assam-political-map.jpg" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The process of deportation also
violates international law relating to human rights and diplomatic protocols.
It is described as follows: “When the people are forced across the border, all
their possessions are taken away, along with any signs that may point to their
Indian origin. They are warned that if they turn back, they will be shot as
infiltrators. As parting advice, they are also cautioned to tell the
Bangladeshi Rifles, if they are caught across the border that they are
returning from some work or wedding from a particular village. Thus poor
people, deliberately bereft of identity and citizenship, have no option but to
again take the path of illegality merely in order to survive.” Diplomatic protocols (under the Vienna
Convention on Diplomatic Relations, 1961) require that when deportation takes
place the embassy or high commission or any other representative of the state
of the country of origin of the deportee be informed about the decision. This
is never done in cases of deportation of supposed Bangladeshis. The extra-legal
process followed by India effectively renders the people involved stateless and
violates Article 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948 (UDHR),
particularly clause 2 which says: no one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his
nationality ...</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
One is not against detection and
deportation of foreigners from <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Assam</st1:country>
and <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">India</st1:country>.
On the contrary one believes in the right to return of all persons who are
foreign nationals living as refugees or immigrants (legal or illegal). The
concern is over the processes employed. As these processes are not in
conformity with the due process principle and international human rights
standards they provide tools to harass genuine citizens on one hand and on the
other hand, violations of basic human rights of all persons involved.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Attitude of both the central and
state governments is indifferent to both the questions of deportation and
deportation under due process and approach of the judiciary is also deplorable
as the utterances they make time and again seem to be insensitive to the
principles of liberal jurisprudence and human rights. For a permanent solution
of the problem the approach must change.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
</div>
RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-9627760436549018192012-06-13T16:32:00.000+05:302012-06-13T16:51:11.370+05:30PUDR condemns arrest of Assam activist<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; text-align: justify;">
The People's Union For Democratic Rights (PUDR), a national rights organisation based in New Delhi, strongly condemned arrest of an activist in Assam saying that it is an attempt of the government to intimidate the anti-dam popular movement into silence and submission.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiygD_4uvoosPVqH2cgH3RuY0jKkIO374DGQTqjMRnFg-BHW5bRNf4oegMdEl_UGCZp0n9Py3B-qehkHOjBTUOuiQB_0OGAMISbMG1cZBDCMr5Jf6pPg6y9ECE7o08-_jTuVbNRTLEyIbY/s1600/NIA+logo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiygD_4uvoosPVqH2cgH3RuY0jKkIO374DGQTqjMRnFg-BHW5bRNf4oegMdEl_UGCZp0n9Py3B-qehkHOjBTUOuiQB_0OGAMISbMG1cZBDCMr5Jf6pPg6y9ECE7o08-_jTuVbNRTLEyIbY/s200/NIA+logo.jpg" width="189" /></a></div>
Activist Mr Pallab Barbora was arrested from his home in Merapani of Golaghat district in Assam on 3 June 2012 and has been remanded to ten days custody of National Investigative Agency (NIA) on 6 June. The NIA alleged that he had facilitated the spread of Communist Party of India (Maoist) in the state. The CPI (M) party is an organization banned by the Indian government. Security agencies also alleged that he was advocating for the intensification of the popular anti-mega-dam movement in Assam.</div>
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On the contrary, the PUDR claimed that Mr Barbora was actively involved in numerous forums over the years highlighting issues of violation of rights. He was a long associate of the Manab Adhikar Sangram Samiti (MASS), an Assam-based human rights body. Recently he was active in the anti-mega-dams movement led by Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti (KMSS) and others. It is a commonplace for every keen observer of the movement against mega-dam that Mr Barbora was instrumental in forming the Mega Dam Resistance Forum, according the PUDR.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-mBqVZYIAyFhoy1u_lgCE84kj3YKE8D5-ra2BRZEqCyfv3JhIcquGyis1nDotSuj7cgZSwBktFMDEdcKkx03iubLBneVrbyuEOAK1jW9DpLvCz9qKdwIr4FFyXs6rFuItDIvIg2rJNEQ/s1600/KMSS+and+AASU+demonstration+against+dams+in+the+first+week+of+September+2011+(Photo-+sinlung.com).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-mBqVZYIAyFhoy1u_lgCE84kj3YKE8D5-ra2BRZEqCyfv3JhIcquGyis1nDotSuj7cgZSwBktFMDEdcKkx03iubLBneVrbyuEOAK1jW9DpLvCz9qKdwIr4FFyXs6rFuItDIvIg2rJNEQ/s320/KMSS+and+AASU+demonstration+against+dams+in+the+first+week+of+September+2011+(Photo-+sinlung.com).jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">KMSS and AASU demonstration against dams in <br />the first week of September 2011 (Photo- sinlung.com)</td></tr>
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The rights body also said that giving out two statements by the security agencies in such a manner that one claimed him to be a kingpin of maoist activities in Assam and the then saying that he is instrumental in anti-dam movements has an effect of making the activities of organizing a democratic protest look illegal and illegitimate, because he is already charged under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) and various other sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).</div>
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"<i>The Government, in order to forcefully pursue its corporate led development policy, is using police and other para-military forces to silence the democratically organized protests. The organisers of such protest movements are regularly being framed in the most draconian laws so that the anti people projects could be implemented to protect the interest of the big corporate. The government is regularly projecting these organisers as 'terrorists' or 'Maoists' by citing strange and unverifiable 'intelligence'/'police' sources. By invoking UAPA and by using the stick of association with 'banned' organisation it has become easy for authorities to damn people's protest. Even the judicial process is being used to intern them indefinitely in the prison and thus silence their voice of descent. Therefore, arrest of Pallab Barbora is obviously an attempt to intimidate the anti-dam popular movement into silence and submission</i>" the PUDR said in a release signed by its secretaries Mr Paramjeet Singh and Ms Preeti Chauhan.</div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Originally published in the <a href="http://newsblaze.com/story/20120610102917lask.nb/topstory.html" target="_blank">Newsblaze</a> at <a href="http://newsblaze.com/story/20120610102917lask.nb/topstory.html">http://newsblaze.com/story/20120610102917lask.nb/topstory.html</a></span></div>
</div>RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-79180644123842704362012-06-05T14:08:00.000+05:302012-06-05T14:08:24.208+05:30Investigation ordered into Assam trafficking racket<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) taking strong exception at the flourishing flesh trade in red light area in Silchar, Assam which was started for British soldiers during the World War-II expressed surprise at its continuous existence and asked the authorities to conduct an investigation and bring to book the persons who run this human trafficking trade.</div>
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The NHRC was hearing cases of 3 victims at its Guwahati camp sitting on 28 May 2012. The commission recommended the state government of Assam to provide these three victims with a compensation of Rs 100000.00 (one lakh) each. The victims were rescued by Agnes Kharshiing and her organisation Civil Society Women Organisation of Mehgalaya.</div>
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The victims belonged to the Mehgalaya state and hundreds others like them are brought here from other states of North-East India and possibly also from neighbouring countries like Bangladesh, Myanmar, Nepal etc. It is estimated that at present about 1200 victims are kept captive and forced into prostitution.</div>
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According to Ms Kharshiing, Assam police is hand in gloves with the traffickers and not at all serious about their duties of preventing human trafficking. Often they act as partners of the traffickers, she claimed. Social activists in Silchar say that the police is not doing their jobs it is because influential people with political connections are behind this trade of human beings.</div>
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The intervention of the NHRC revived some hope in the civil society that now the authorities may take actions.</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(<i>Originally published in the <a href="http://newsblaze.com/story/20120604103939lask.nb/topstory.html" target="_blank">Newsblaze</a> and can be accessed at </i></span><a href="http://newsblaze.com/story/20120604103939lask.nb/topstory.html" style="background-color: transparent; font-size: small; text-align: left;"><i>http://newsblaze.com/story/20120604103939lask.nb/topstory.html</i></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">)</span></div>
</div>RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-23038652166238577742012-06-04T13:04:00.003+05:302012-06-04T13:04:32.261+05:30Overview of human rights in India in 2012<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">This brief report on human rights in India titled <strong><span style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration: none;"><a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/2012/06/03/1359/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration: none;">Human Rights in India: Status Report 2012</a></span></strong> gives a general overview of the most critical human rights issues in India today. It has been drafted by the Working Group on Human Rights in India and the UN (WGHR), a platform of some of Inida’s important human rights groups, as a background document to assist in the preparation of India’s second Universal Periodic Review (UPR) that took place in Geneva on 24 May, 2012. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">It is amply evident from the report that much remains to be done to improve the human rights situation in India. The scope of the UPR is enormous as it covers all recognised international human rights. If we take almost any of these human rights, the situation inIndiaremains challenging; yet the scope for improvement is immense. If the required positive changes are to take place, however, a radical change in national and regional actions by governments at all levels is necessary. The report highlights some of these required changes. (<a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/2012/06/03/1359/" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration: none;">Read more</a> or <a href="https://bhrpc.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/status-report-23-05-version.pdf" style="color: #b85b5a;"><span style="color: #b85b5a;">downloaded from </span><strong style="color: #b85b5a;">here</strong></a>)</span></div>
</div>RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-56965968874606696372012-06-03T16:44:00.000+05:302012-06-05T14:38:27.334+05:30Dr. Rumee Nath: Conversion, religion and politics<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Assam Secretariat</td></tr>
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People of <st1:country-region w:st="on">Assam</st1:country-region>,
particularly those living in southern part, have been very tense for some days.
Ever since gossip about the conversion of a sitting member of the state
legislative assembly (MLA) from her religion of birth Hinduism into Islam has
started doing the round in the media it has become a pre-occupation of sections
of the people belonging to both the religions to fan the controversy and reap
some political or other dividends. Particularly, it has come to light that some
groups belonging to the Hindu right are making not so surreptitious efforts to poison
peaceful co-existence between the communities over the personal choice of the
MLA. </div>
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A little known Silchar based
group called Adhibakta Parishad is making desperate efforts to create communal
tension in Barak valley (<st1:place w:st="on">South Assam</st1:place>) following
the reported conversion of sitting Congress MLA Dr Rumee Nath into Islam and
her marriage with a Muslim boy while her previous marriage subsists. <a href="http://www.sentinelassam.com/cachar/story.php?sec=2&subsec=12&id=118671&dtP=2012-05-26&ppr=1#118671">The
group has smelt ‘Love Jehad’ behind her actions</a>. They are alleging that
‘Love Jehad’ which, according to them, is a new ploy of the Islamic
fundamentalist-terrorist to compel non-Muslim women to embrace Islam, might be
instrumental behind her conversion and marriage. They are also dragging into it
an <st1:place w:st="on">Assam</st1:place>
Minister Siddique Ahmed. (See a news report here: http://www.sentinelassam.com/cachar/story.php?sec=2&subsec=12&id=118671&dtP=2012-05-26&ppr=1#118671)<o:p></o:p></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLGurgm9tzytsgdC-XVJf7YkO8j6ixAUWPmLE6EmnD1YgHoa3KEoU5zlG2Z8eWJ2lIh30Uc52TVzpSI5hHvHy4g2xOffys9-3vfnMVm7CI5Tp-pIhuHteRz42CsgLyziLktiQU8cLRZ48/s1600/Convert+MLA+Dr+Rumee+Nath+with+her+young+daughter+(before+she+abandoned+the+young+girl+for+a+new+husband)-+Photo--+manipalworldnews.com.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Convert MLA Dr Rumee Nath with her young daughter (before she abandoned the young girl for a new husband)- Photo-- manipalworldnews.com" border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLGurgm9tzytsgdC-XVJf7YkO8j6ixAUWPmLE6EmnD1YgHoa3KEoU5zlG2Z8eWJ2lIh30Uc52TVzpSI5hHvHy4g2xOffys9-3vfnMVm7CI5Tp-pIhuHteRz42CsgLyziLktiQU8cLRZ48/s320/Convert+MLA+Dr+Rumee+Nath+with+her+young+daughter+(before+she+abandoned+the+young+girl+for+a+new+husband)-+Photo--+manipalworldnews.com.jpg" title="Convert MLA Dr Rumee Nath with her young daughter (before she abandoned the young girl for a new husband)- Photo-- manipalworldnews.com" width="179" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Convert MLA Dr Rumee Nath with <br />her young daughter (before she <br />abandoned the young <br />girl for a new husband)- <br />Photo-- manipalworldnews.com</td></tr>
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What Dr Nath did is entirely her
personal choice. She is a sitting MLA of the ruling party and a daughter of a
most successful businessman in the valley. There is no question of element of
coercion working on her. The term love-jihad is coined in the south to condemn
and communalise any conversion to Islam of Hindu girls out of free will and
choice that is followed by her marriage with a Muslim boy. <o:p></o:p></div>
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Every citizen of <st1:country-region w:st="on">India</st1:country-region> has the
fundamental constitutional rights to freedom of thought, conscience and belief.
S/he also has a right to practise, profess and propagate any religion of her
choice. It obviously includes the right to convert into any other religion or
non-religion from the religion of birth.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
However, the deeds of the MLA can
at best be called immature and incorrect. They are spiritually, politically and
also legally incorrect. But they are not
incorrect in themselves. Conversion and re-marriage by themselves are legal and
in some cases may appear to be desirable for the individuals concerned. In this
case, the rashness with which she has accomplished them made them incorrect and
immature. <o:p></o:p></div>
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Spiritually incorrect, because
the intention behind her conversion appears not to achieve any spiritual
upliftment, rather she wanted to deceive the law, particularly the prohibition
of bigamy in section 17 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 and Section 494 of the
Indian Penal Code, 1860 which punishes bigamy. <o:p></o:p></div>
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It is also politically incorrect
because it gives chance to the right-wing opposition to poison the political
and social environment. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
I do not want to go into the
details of spiritual and political correctness and incorrectness of her acts
here.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Let me just briefly deal with the
legal position of her reported deeds.<o:p></o:p></div>
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As it involves reported
conversion into Islam, it would be good to examine the Islamic law first. <o:p></o:p></div>
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According to my friend Maolana
Joynal Abedin, when a non Muslim married woman becomes Muslima and her husband
remains non-Muslim, the latter will be proposed to adopt Islam by Qazi. If he
accepts this proposal his wife will remain his wife. On the other hand if he
rejects the proposal Qazi will declare separation between them. This separation
is a Talaq according to Imam Abu Hanifa and Imam Muhammad. (FATHUL QADIR).<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhd1NdjUX9wECgfdPzS_8e4noUMU5Ivd_FN1o9TDYz18SkxtOydDJl3ItRsdMQLMxIIZ_feWVbtqSz6n5D7rguSY1D8tEpHCdhy9DL4iujlVNZUz7L2LRmx8rkE5aGA2E0s63tHcIop9j4/s1600/Islam+(Symbol).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhd1NdjUX9wECgfdPzS_8e4noUMU5Ivd_FN1o9TDYz18SkxtOydDJl3ItRsdMQLMxIIZ_feWVbtqSz6n5D7rguSY1D8tEpHCdhy9DL4iujlVNZUz7L2LRmx8rkE5aGA2E0s63tHcIop9j4/s200/Islam+(Symbol).jpg" width="181" /></a></div>
He also says that proposal of
embracing Islam stated in this Law of Shariah is applicable in Islamic country
only. In non Islamic country, which may be Darul-harb or Darul-aman, when
arises situation like this, husband will not be proposed to take Islam. Because,
there is no Qazi to propose and declare separation in such a country. After getting
converted into Islam a non-Muslim married woman in non Islamic country while
her husband remains non-Muslim separation will take place between them
certainly as per Shariah Law. But it is not in the moment of conversion. It
will take place after three menstrual period if she is in that state. If she is
pregnant, separation will take place after delivery, otherwise after three
months. Before separation no Muslim man can marry her according to Shariah Law.</div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
For a valid conversion it is also
required that the new convert should hold herself to the world as a Muslim. In
this case, according to the media report, conversion and marriage took place at
a time in a single sitting. The new convert, thereafter, denied the facts of
conversion and marriage in public for some days. She has not held herself as a
Muslim to the world soon after her conversion. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
More over, the statement of Islamic
law made above may be the position of pure Islamic law. However, it is to be
kept in mind that it has only moral and persuasive force and no legally binding
force. The part of Islamic law applicable in <st1:country-region w:st="on">India</st1:country-region> as Muslim personal law is a
different thing. That part of Islamic law which deals with certain personal
matters including marriage and divorce as modified by the Parliament of India
from time to time and as understood, interpreted and applied by the Supreme
Court of India is enforced in <st1:country-region w:st="on">India</st1:country-region>
as the Muslim personal law by virtue of the Muslim Personal Law (Shariat) Act, 1937.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The Supreme Court and other
courts in <st1:country-region w:st="on">India</st1:country-region>
interpret and apply Muslim personal law in the light of the constitutional and
legal framework of the country. Because events in human life and actions of
human beings are always interdependent and inter-connected and can not be
completely separated. The same action that falls within the domain of personal
law may also constitute a crime under the general penal law of the country. The
civil aspect of such and action of person who is subject to the Muslim personal
law will be dealt with under this law and the criminal aspect will be dealt
with under general criminal law. Therefore the personal aw can not be seen and
applied in complete ignorance of the broader constitutional and legal scheme of
the country.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Having said that let me go to the
point in hand. The point seems to be the status of a person in marriage and in
other matters who was non-Muslim and married and got converted into Islam and
then re-married another person. A similar case was extensively dealt with by
the Supreme Court and a historic judgement was passed on 5 May 2002 in the case
of Lily Thomas and Other Vs. Union of India and Others. [Citations are 2000 AIR
1650, 2000(3) SCR1081, 2000 (6) SCC 224, 2000 (4 ) SCALE 176 , 2000 (5 ) JT 617]<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The bench was constituted by
Justices R P Sethi and S Saghir Ahmed and the judgment was authored by Justice
S Sghir Ahmed. It was a judgment on a review petition where the All India
Muslim Personal Law Board and the Jamiat Ulema Hind etc also took part.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVuFseORDfJzezLJ6p8s7kZ8uzbUHEvimyaopKgwKUGGPJHAwGP7WzwlQ7cwbU9SKPgzOVcPj9eg363f2kawK6D0254Qc5Af-jebWr32UAZ8avviB2F-u4pRzif1OB5NbAT5azlhP591w/s1600/Rumee+Nath+with+her+new+husband,+Photo--+thepunjabkesari.com.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVuFseORDfJzezLJ6p8s7kZ8uzbUHEvimyaopKgwKUGGPJHAwGP7WzwlQ7cwbU9SKPgzOVcPj9eg363f2kawK6D0254Qc5Af-jebWr32UAZ8avviB2F-u4pRzif1OB5NbAT5azlhP591w/s200/Rumee+Nath+with+her+new+husband,+Photo--+thepunjabkesari.com.jpg" width="186" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rumee Nath with her new husband.<br />Photo-- thepunjabkesari.com</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
It has been held that "The
concept of Muslim law is based upon the edifice of Shariat. Muslim law as
traditionally interpreted and applied in India permits more than one marriage
during the subsistence of one and another though capacity to do justice between
co-wives in law is condition precedent. Even under the Muslim law plurality of
marriage is not unconditionally conferred upon the husband. It would, therefore,
be doing injustice to Islamic Law to urge that the convert is entitled to
practice bigamy notwithstanding the continuance of his marriage under the law
to which he belonged before conversion. The violators of law who have
contracted the second marriage cannot be permitted to urge that such marriage
should not be made subject matter of prosecution under the general Penal Law
prevalent in the country. The progressive outlook and wider approach of Islamic
law cannot be permitted to be squeezed and narrowed by unscrupulous litigants, apparently
indulging in sensual lust sought to be quenched by illegal means who apparently
are found to be guilty of the commission of the offence under the law to which
they belonged before their alleged conversion. It is nobody’s case that any
such convert has been deprived of practicing any other religious right for the attainment
of spiritual goals. Islam which is pious, progressive and respected religion
with rational outlook cannot be given a narrow concept as has been tried to be
done by the alleged violators of law.’<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Under the Muslim Law one can
avoid criminal liability for bigamy only when the previous marriage is also
under the Muslim Law. In any case, in the instant case before the court, the
conversion is feigned and not because of a change in real faith. About
conversion, Justice S. Saghir Ahmad writes: ‘Religion is a matter of faith
stemming from the depth of the heart and mind. Religion is a belief which binds
the spiritual nature of man to a supernatural being; it is an object of
conscientious devotion, faith and pietism. Devotion in its fullest sense is a
consecration and devotes an act of worship. Faith in the strict sense
constitutes firm reliance on the truth of religious doctrines in every system
of religion. Religion, faith or devotion is not easily interchangeable. If the
person feigns to have accepted another religion just for some worldly gain or
benefit, it would be religious bigotry. Looked at from this angle, a person who
mockingly adopts another religion where plurality of marriage is permitted so
as to renounce the previous marriage and desert the wife, he cannot be
permitted to take advantage of his exploitation as religion is not a commodity
to be exploited.’ <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgn6rTIUMOK6qdMVDrmYcDKtNBsWESyspqtfIiMxqXLrYjrI1Z3sIwQW_DYFtw6m5Phg_6ljOxkFxqizA7sUqyxUb8AZgm0ZlXcxsGdcuWc3zezghGk4ATZgNcUQI-9-WjrNPZ9_A0YmAs/s1600/Supreme+Court+of+India.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgn6rTIUMOK6qdMVDrmYcDKtNBsWESyspqtfIiMxqXLrYjrI1Z3sIwQW_DYFtw6m5Phg_6ljOxkFxqizA7sUqyxUb8AZgm0ZlXcxsGdcuWc3zezghGk4ATZgNcUQI-9-WjrNPZ9_A0YmAs/s320/Supreme+Court+of+India.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Supreme Court of India</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
It was urged on behalf of the
review petitioners that to prosecute a new Muslim for second marriage is
against the provisions of Articles 21, 25 and 26 of the Constitution. No
substance was found by the court in such argument. It has been admitted before
the court that no personal liberty or religious freedom of the petitioners has
been affected. Concern has been expressed that new converts can be punished
without procedure established by law only on the basis of the admission of the
second marriage. It is a mere suspicion without any basis. The Sarla Mudgal
judgment (the review petition was against this judgement) has neither laid down
any new law for the trial of persons contracting second marriage nor a new
procedure to that effect. The person seeking conviction of the accused for a
commission of offence under Section 494 IPC is under a legal obligation to
prove all the ingredients of the offence charged and conviction cannot be based
upon mere admission outside the court. To attract the provisions of Section 494,
the second marriage has to be proved besides proving the previous marriage. Such
marriage is further required to be proved to have been performed or celebrated
with proper ceremonies.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
It is further held that it is not
proper to say that ban on the second marriage after conversion and prosecution
of the convert under Section 494 IPC is against the provisions of religious
freedom guaranteed under Article 25 of the Constitution. The Sarla Mudgal
judgment has not violated any body’s right to conscience and right to freely
propagate his religion. Freedom guaranteed under Article 25 is such freedom
which does not encroach upon a similar freedom of the other persons. Under the
Constitutional Scheme every person has a fundamental right not merely to
entertain the religious belief of his choice but also to exhibit his belief and
ideas in a manner which does not infringe the religious right and personal
freedom of others.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The facts of the case were Smt. Sushmita
Ghosh filed a Writ Petition No. 509 of 1992 in the Supreme Court and stated
that she was married to Mr. G.C. Ghosh (now Mohd. Karim Ghazi) according to
Hindu rites on 10 May, 1984. He asked her to agree for a divorce by mutual
consent as he had converted to Islam and was to marry Ms Vanita Gupta (a mother
of two children) in the second week of July. Smt. Sushmita challenged the
second marriage of her husband as being violative of Article 15 (1) of the
Constitution, she also submitted that Shri Ghosh had converted to Islam not
being influenced by its teachings and ideals but only for the purpose of the
second marriage. After conversion, he has done no overt act of being a Muslim. He
has not mutated or got entered his new name in the official records. His
conversion is simply feigned and sham. She had got filed the case through Smt. Sarla
Mudgal, the president of an NGO Kalyani in 1992 which was decided in 1995. During
the pendency of this case Mr. Mohd. Karim Ghazi had married Ms Vinita Gupta (now
Hena Begum) on 3 September, 1992 and a son was born out of this second wedlock.
Ms Sushmita filed the birth certificate of this baby in the Court in which the
name of the father and mother was written as G.C. Ghosh and Vinita Ghosh
respectively. She also filed copy of the voters’ list for the year 1994 in
which the name of the husband and wife were mentioned as G. C. Ghosh and Vinita
Ghosh. Mr. Mohd. Karim Ghazi had applied for <st1:country-region w:st="on">Bangladesh</st1:country-region> visa. Ms Sushmita filed
copy of that document also in the court in 1994 in which his name was written
as Gyan Chand Ghosh and religion was mentioned as Hindu. The name of the
husband and wife were mentioned as Mohd. Karim Ghazi and Hena Begum in the
Nikahnama which was issued by Mufti Mohd. Tayyab Qasmi. Signature on it was
legible as G.C. Ghosh. Ms Kapil Gupta, the mother of the bride had signed as a
witness.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqQd_q7kWDFtDubA1CAzU_zhwzpGCUicO3ho_-Cv7P4URLKkYfnP3B_dWHrN4Q1N0_ZsYinsW1HPWKkcD0KN0bxdYxF8Q7dh6tGAKY8QsWM9vUX3Kh6bqVINYQHRYQln9LIhyphenhyphenqMOE-JZU/s1600/Hinduism+(symbol).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="165" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqQd_q7kWDFtDubA1CAzU_zhwzpGCUicO3ho_-Cv7P4URLKkYfnP3B_dWHrN4Q1N0_ZsYinsW1HPWKkcD0KN0bxdYxF8Q7dh6tGAKY8QsWM9vUX3Kh6bqVINYQHRYQln9LIhyphenhyphenqMOE-JZU/s200/Hinduism+(symbol).jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
In view of this position of law
of the land it is clear that the married non-Muslim woman who got converted to
marry another spouse while her previous marriage subsists is liable to be
punished under section 17 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 and section 494 and 495
of the Indian Penal Code, 1860. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Section 17 of the Hindu Marriage
Act, 1955 says: Any marriage between two Hindus solemnized after the
commencement of this Act is void if at the date of such marriage either party
had a husband or wife living; and the provisions of sections 494 and 495 of the
Indian Penal Code (45 of 1860), shall apply accordingly.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Section 494 of the IPC says: Whoever, having a husband or wife
living, marries in any case in which such marriage is void by reason of its
taking place during the life of such husband or wife, shall be punished with
imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to seven years, and
shall also be liable to fine.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Exception.—This section does not
extend to any person whose marriage with such husband or wife has been declared
void by a Court of competent jurisdiction, nor to any person who contracts a
marriage during the life of a former husband or wife, if such husband or wife, at
the time of the subsequent marriage, shall have been continually absent from
such person for the space of seven years, and shall not have been heard of by
such person as being alive within that time provided the person contracting
such subsequent marriage shall, before such marriage takes place, inform the
person with whom such marriage is contracted of the real state of facts so far
as the same are within his or her knowledge.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Section 495 says: Whoever commits the offence
defined in the last preceding section having concealed from the person with
whom the subsequent marriage is contracted, the fact of the former marriage, shall
be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may
extend to ten years, and shall also be liable to fine.</div>
</div>RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-29344897576437844082012-05-30T03:17:00.000+05:302012-05-30T03:17:41.355+05:30NHRC pulls up Assam over starvation and rights violations<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEja_KtwBkY8RiYJPq4bU7n4qB-KA-5hAyvLI3_gkEWuCcqyGZYfX6P1vtD5M_cXX6Ig3kPnC8xbAFyqVWwOaW7oAfa3T69KMVIaePUirUnCynL6PlP0UXPJNva71Pm8b3rRrxSyWS95uKc/s1600/A+woman+labourer+in+the+hunger+struck+Bhuvan+valley+tea+estate+in+Cachar,+Assam.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEja_KtwBkY8RiYJPq4bU7n4qB-KA-5hAyvLI3_gkEWuCcqyGZYfX6P1vtD5M_cXX6Ig3kPnC8xbAFyqVWwOaW7oAfa3T69KMVIaePUirUnCynL6PlP0UXPJNva71Pm8b3rRrxSyWS95uKc/s400/A+woman+labourer+in+the+hunger+struck+Bhuvan+valley+tea+estate+in+Cachar,+Assam.jpg" title="A woman worker: living a under the shadow of death with no adequate food, no proper housing and no medical care" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A woman worker: living a under the shadow of death with no <br />adequate food, no proper housing and no medical care</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; text-align: justify;">
The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) pulls up the government of Assam over hunger deaths of tea labourers and other cases of human rights violations. In its camp sitting in Guwahati held on 28th May 2012 the NHRC heard about 50 pending cases relating to Assam state of North East India.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; text-align: justify;">
'Out of 17 cases, which the full commission heard, at least 6 cases were closed after the commission got satisfactory answers from the state authorities. In the other cases, the commission has given time to the authorities to respond to its recommendations. The commission recommended about rupees (Indian currency) 1.8 million (18 lakh) as monetary relief in different cases of human rights violations', NHRC said in a release to the press.</div>
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<br /></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTad8X1Q3inwwWyg2dcp2Shm5UnzPNu-hhOBvOITAtELNkr1B9mvHInaQD-gBkAwfSnRErwl6_tU5HLmVKysCIulhGzzHdrZoIA6lJSxWbuS9zR7HObH90cdXGj7bpd59M3YDt6cXbnHY/s1600/Ramashish+Dushad+lying+on+a+bedstead%252C+his+legs+are+apparently+swelled+and+infected.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTad8X1Q3inwwWyg2dcp2Shm5UnzPNu-hhOBvOITAtELNkr1B9mvHInaQD-gBkAwfSnRErwl6_tU5HLmVKysCIulhGzzHdrZoIA6lJSxWbuS9zR7HObH90cdXGj7bpd59M3YDt6cXbnHY/s320/Ramashish+Dushad+lying+on+a+bedstead%252C+his+legs+are+apparently+swelled+and+infected.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A former labourer lying in his courtyard who died later due to <br />hunger and lack of medical treatment without medical care</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; text-align: justify;">
'In the matter relating to starvation deaths in the Bhuvan valley tea estate in Cachar district, the commission has asked the state government to pay rupees 0.2 million each to the two tea garden workers and rupees 0.1 million (1 lakh) each to about 13 dependents of the workers who died due to starvation. The Commission has also directed the state government to inquire whether the Tea Association of India (TAI) was distributing the food grains properly among the workers or not' said the NHRC. The government provides the tea workers with food items from the Public Distribution System (PDS) through the TAI which is not favorably seen by the commission.</div>
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<br /></div>
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The NHRC release further stated that in a case relating to rehabilitation of children rendered orphan or destitute in communal riots in upper Assam districts, the commission asked the state government to identify the child victims without any further delay and give financial assistance to them and sent compliance report along with proof of payment within eight weeks. The Commission observed that it is the negligence of officers that led to orphaned children not getting timely assistance despite the fact that so many years have past since the riots.</div>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHiuzmYmPmZN3cg2qpfayH_llNwk2WuVpBEd2ug5L4z88C7ufRdMK7o3XJ82di8ERl6nF4MuwxkVZOVSZ0bTgJh8MsmxDzl59We2g36xXRMr9sAVplLW7j3q-LVsLwM1_PerpPOOj-iMs/s1600/House+of+Atul+Bauri+who+recently+died+allegedly+of+starvation.+His+daughter+and+other+family+members+are+in+front+of+the+house.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="House of Atul Bauri who recently died allegedly of starvation. His daughter and other family members are in front of the house" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHiuzmYmPmZN3cg2qpfayH_llNwk2WuVpBEd2ug5L4z88C7ufRdMK7o3XJ82di8ERl6nF4MuwxkVZOVSZ0bTgJh8MsmxDzl59We2g36xXRMr9sAVplLW7j3q-LVsLwM1_PerpPOOj-iMs/s320/House+of+Atul+Bauri+who+recently+died+allegedly+of+starvation.+His+daughter+and+other+family+members+are+in+front+of+the+house.JPG" title="House of Atul Bauri who recently died allegedly of starvation. His daughter and other family members are in front of the house" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">House of Atul Bauri who recently died allegedly of starvation. <br />His daughter and other family members are in front of the house</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; text-align: justify;">
In the cases relating to force prostitution of three women in Cachar district, the commission asked the state government to pay rupees one lakh each to the three victims. The government was also asked to inquire whether there was any organized activity going on in the state of Assam to bring girls from Meghalaya to Cachar and Silchar and forced them into prostitution. The authorities have been asked to take action against the guilty.</div>
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On the issue of witch hunting, the state authorities admitted that this practice is prevalent in backward and distantly located places. During last five years, about 88 women and over 40 men became victims of such incidents. The commission has asked the state authorities to create awareness among people and strive for fast investigation and speedy trial in incidents of witch hunting to at the deterrent.</div>
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The commission also heard encounter and custodial death cases in its two division benches and asked the police authorities to scrupulously adhere to its guidelines and submit all the reports to the commission timely for early disposal of such cases.</div>
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<br />The Assam based human rights group <a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Barak Human Rights Protection Committee (BHRPC)</a>, the group that has been reporting the starvation deaths of tea workers and fighting for their cause and complainant in several other cases, said that this move of the NHRC to dispose of pending cases expediently and to reach out to the remote areas in a bid to sensitize the government officials and talk with the civil society groups are great steps and have been long overdue. This will go a long to protect rights of the people encouraging the independent human rights defenders and the recommendations and observations of the NHRC will work as strong disincentive to the potential violators among the officials.<br /><br />Originally published in the <a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/2012/05/29/nhrc-pulls-up-assam/" target="_blank">BHRPC site</a> and also cross posted in the <a href="http://newsblaze.com/story/20120529104144lask.nb/topstory.html" target="_blank">Newsblaze</a>.</div>
</div>RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-71199537629406130832012-05-27T01:27:00.001+05:302012-05-27T01:27:15.563+05:30Rights group voices concern over police brutality in West Bengal<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The Hong Kong based rights group Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has expressed concern over a case of illegal arrest, detention and police brutality against Mr Golam Kibria from Murshidabad district, West Bengal, India. Calling it a case of senseless brutality the AHRC said in a release that this is yet another incident in a seemingly infinite number of cases wherein law enforcement agencies due to ingrained malpractices and callous attitudes have committed criminal acts against helpless individuals under their jurisdiction.</div>
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The AHRC wrote to the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Arrest and Detention and the Special Rapporteur on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment calling for their intervention in this case.</div>
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Citing an inquiry undertaken by MASUM, a West Bengal based human rights organisation, the AHRC said that the victim of illegal arrest, detention and torture was 30-year-old Mr Golam Kibria from the Murshidabad district, who endured physical assault and injury from police officers from Jalangi Police Station led by Mr Manas Maity, the Officer-in-Charge of Jalangi Police Station and the Sub-Divisional Police Officer, Domkal, Murshidabad.</div>
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The police encircled the house of Mr Samsul Huda (Golam Kibria's father and a retired school teacher) at 1.30am on 4 May 2012 and began to strike the front door repeatedly, demanding entry. The police then forcibly entered the house and violently laid hands on Mr Golam Kibria, whose hands were tied with a rope and held above his head while the police brutally beat him. The victim was then taken to Jalangi Police Station.</div>
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Reports were soon heard that the police had completely removed his clothes and assaulted him again in his naked condition while in their custody. The severely injured victim was released from Jalangi Police Station on 5 May 2012 without any explanation as to his arrest the previous day or for the barbarism that was visited upon him during his unlawful detention.</div>
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Medical reports demonstrate the gravity of the assault upon Mr Golam Kibria, who is still being treated. The victim is himself still in shock and greatly traumatised by this unwarranted violence against his person. The victim's family members and some other locals witnessed the incident, but they are unable to seek justice because the police they have to report the case to would be the very same group of men who had themselves tortured the victim. Although these heinous criminal acts against Mr Golam Kibria are in themselves despicable, the criminality of the entire law enforcement agency is equally undeniable and even more troubling. The law has failed to provide back-up avenues through which the individual who was not in the first instance protected, could seek justice and compensation, and through which the perpetrators could be punished.</div>
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Mincing no words the rights body said that something is terribly wrong with the justice system in India. When individuals and entire communities live in fear of their own safety because of the arbitrariness and senselessness of violence; when agencies that were designed specifically to protect and uphold rule of law are themselves perpetrators of these acts; when police personnel, logically the moral exemplars for the societies they administer, are able to behave with complete impunity and are not subjected to intense scrutiny from the centre - it is a broken, dysfunctional system, a failure of humanism, a mockery of ideals.</div>
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Without intervention by the central government, the people of Murshidabad and all over India face, for the foreseeable future, continued abuse of their freedoms and physical person and no likelihood for justice to be served to those acting with complete impunity.</div>
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Along with the UN entities the AHRC also wrote to the Indian authorities demanding impartial and credible investigation into the case and compensation to the victim.</div>
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More importantly, the body called on to the Central authorities to take steps to circumscribe such acts of violence and impunity by instituting safeguards (such as external observers or auditors appointed by the centre) at the provincial level to monitor and enforce adherence to the legal procedures stipulated by the state government. The Central authorities should also take steps toward revising their stance toward Article 9 of the International Covenant Civil and Political Rights and toward acceding to the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel Inhuman and Degrading Treatment and Punishment in order to become even more credible in the commitment to international norms and shared ideals since the Indian state, particularly the central government, should undertake to protect the life, liberty, dignity and personal security of every single person residing in the Indian state under all circumstances through all means possible, demanded the AHRC.</div>
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<span style="font-size: 14px;">Originally published in the <a href="http://newsblaze.com/story/20120525070457lask.nb/topstory.html" target="_blank">Newblaze</a> with the title </span><span style="color: #000090; line-height: 1.4em; text-align: -webkit-auto;"><a href="http://draft.blogger.com/goog_547909677">AHRC Voices Concern Over Case of Police </a></span><span style="color: #000090; line-height: 1.4em; text-align: -webkit-auto;"><a href="http://newsblaze.com/story/20120525070457lask.nb/topstory.html" target="_blank">Brutality in India</a> </span><span style="font-size: 14px;">and available at </span><a href="http://newsblaze.com/story/20120525070457lask.nb/topstory.html" style="background-color: transparent; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">http://newsblaze.com/story/20120525070457lask.nb/topstory.html</span></a></div>
</div>RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2386701100682030794.post-53507487311901328022012-05-23T15:26:00.001+05:302012-05-23T15:46:38.031+05:30Campaign to save tea labourers from huger deaths<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The <a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Barak Human Rights Protection Committee (BHRPC)</a> has started an online petition calling on the authorities in India to save the tea workers of Assam who are dying due to hunger, malnutrition and lack medical attention and care.</div>
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Bacause, according to the BHRPC, it is very shocking that <strong style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 1.05em; line-height: 16px; text-align: justify;">the enforced conditions of starvation and famine and resultant tragedy of hunger deaths of the tea workers of Assam still persists with its all menacing ugliness. Labourers of tea estates in this North East Indian state known worldwide for tea production are dying one after another due to malnutrition and lack of proper health care.</strong></div>
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<strong>So far 15 workers of a particular tea garden in South Assam died and several others are counting their days, according to the information available with the BHRPC. (<a href="http://bhrpc.wordpress.com/2012/05/21/hunger-alert-urge-india-to-save-her-people-from-hunger-death/" target="_blank">Read more here</a>) or</strong><strong style="font-size: 1.05em;"><em><a href="http://www.change.org/petitions/urge-india-to-save-its-people-from-hunger-deaths-2" style="color: #b85b5a; text-decoration: none;"> support the tea workers and sign the petition here.</a></em></strong></div>
</div>RightSpeakshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03030855058769173780noreply@blogger.com0