Video: UK Protest for the Release of Binayaksen


Protesters gathered outside India House, the Indian High Commission in London UK, to demand the release of Dr Binayak Sen, a Doctor and Human Rights Defender, who was arrested in the State of Chhattisgarh, on spurious charges of Maoist links and has been held without bail for a year.

Dr Sen has spent his working life providing health and defending the rights of those who are unable to fend for themselves, namely the majority Tribal population in Central India.

The Global Health Council has awarded him the Jonathan Mann award for 2008, for his work in the field of Health and Human Rights among the most diadvantaged of our Society.

22 distinguished Nobel Laureates have, in an unprecedented act, written to the Central Government of India and the State Government of Chhattisgarh requesting Dr Sen’s release on bail so that he may attend the award ceremony in Washington on the 29th of May 2008.

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May 28, 2008 | Filed Under Global day of protest, Protests | Leave a Comment 

Fight For Rights, Face State Fury: Tehelka Report

CURRENT AFFAIRS
the rights debate

Tehelka

First, Binayak Sen. Now, filmmaker-activist Ajay TG is arrested under draconian laws for opposing the Salva Judum

SHOBHITA NAITHANI
New Delhi

IT’S APRIL 2004. Human rights activist and general secretary of the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) Chhattisgarh unit Dr Binayak Sen, sociology professor Nandini Sundar, freelance journalist and filmmaker Ajay Thachhappully Gangadharan (TG) and a local man are in Bastar, Chhattisgarh’s tribal district. They are observing how the Lok Sabha elections are being conducted, the impact of the Maoist ban and the overall situation. There is a visible military presence; helicopters are doing the rounds and personnel of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) are patrolling. As the group of four stop to film an empty polling booth, young Maoists surround them. The group is asked to wait till the headman gives them the go-ahead to film. The headman doesn’t turn up; the Maoists ask them to leave the camera behind. In a 2006 article in the newspaper, DNA, Sundar writes: “A month or so later, the filmmaker got his camera back with an offer of money in case it was spoilt and a letter of apology from a Maoist spokesperson.”

Four years later. On May 6, 2008, Ajay TG’s wife Shobha puts a set of clothes, soap, toothpaste, comb and a packet of biscuits into her bag with her 20-month-old son Aman by her side. At about 10.30am, the 32-year-old speeds off with her brother-in-law on his bike to meet her husband lodged in Kendriya Jail six km away from her house in Durg, on the outskirts of Raipur. In the three years since it came into force, Ajay is the 43rd person to be arrested under the draconian Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act (CSPSA), 2005. Read more

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May 16, 2008 | Filed Under Press Reports | Leave a Comment 

International coalition demands repeal of repressive laws on one-year anniversary of Dr. Binayak Sen’s unjust incarceration

Association for India’s Development
Friends of South Asia
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: May 15, 2008

Send a FREE FAX NOW to PM/CM: http://petitions.aidindia.org/binayaksen/index.php
Protest Videos: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxSoqWab0vE
Pictures : http://gallery.aidindia.org/gallery/gallery2/v/chhattisgarh_001/Binayak+Sen+Solidarity/

San Francisco, CA: Hundreds of Activists from a broad coalition of 50 international human rights groups that includes Amnesty International, National Lawyers’ Guild and SANSAD (South Asian Network for Secularism and Democracy), Canada, took to the streets on two Global days of Action, May 13 & 14, to protest the continued incarceration of human rights crusader, Dr. Binayak Sen. Simultaneous protests were held outside the Indian consulates in London, New York, Washington D.C., San Francisco and Vancouver, while activists in Paris, Stockholm, Boston, Pittsburgh, Houston and many other cities organized vigils, talks, and film screenings to raise awareness about the ongoing persecution of human rights activists. Over 4000 signatures from individuals around the world have been collected on petitions asking for the release of Dr. Sen. Internationally acclaimed intellectuals, including Noam Chomsky, Arundhati Roy, George Galloway, and Mahashweta Devi have all joined in urging the Indian government to free Binayak Sen and stop the harassment of human rights activists. Further, in an unprecedented move, twenty-two Nobel Prize winning scientists and economists have also appealed to the Indian government to release Dr Binayak Sen enabling him to go and receive the 2008 Jonathan Mann Award for Health and Human Rights in Washington later this month. All these documents were submitted to Indian authorities along with hundreds of faxes by individuals demanding the release of Dr.Sen*.

Read more

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May 16, 2008 | Filed Under Global day of protest, Press Release, Protests | 1 Comment 

RIGHTS-INDIA: Top Activist’s Detention Blot on Democracy

By Praful Bidwai
IPS NEWS

NEW DELHI, May 15 (IPS) - Protests are mounting all over the world against the year-long detention of Dr. Binayak Sen, a distinguished Indian human rights and health activist, under draconian laws in the central state of Chhattisgarh.

Sen, national vice president and Chhattisgarh general secretary of the well-known People’s Union of Civil Liberties (PUCL), was arrested under allegations of helping left-wing extremists, known in this country as Naxalites.

The charges shocked human rights organisations and citizens’ groups, which on independent investigation, have found them totally fictitious. They believe that the Chhattisgarh government filed them to harass Sen and set a horribly negative example for all civil liberties activists and intimidate them.

Sen is probably India’s first human rights defender to have faced such prolonged detention.

Sen’s detention raises serious questions about the content and quality of democracy in India, and the state’s failure to respect liberties and fundamental rights guaranteed by the Constitution. It also points to links between human rights violations and the government’s social and economic policies.

Read more

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May 15, 2008 | Filed Under Global day of protest, Press Reports, Protests | Leave a Comment 

Amnesty International statement on the arrest of Ajay TG

India: Concern over the arrest of filmmaker and human rights defender T.G. Ajay in Chhattisgarh

Amnesty International, ASA 20/010/2008

Amnesty International is concerned over the apparently arbitrary arrest of T. G. Ajay, a film-maker and human rights defender who has been documenting problems faced by adivasi (indigenous) communities in protecting their rights, in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh.

Ajay is the second human rights defender to be arrested under the Chhattisgarh State Public Security Act, 2005 (CSPSA), in the state. He is a member of the state executive committee of the People’s Union of Civil Liberties (PUCL).

Ajay is being held in Raipur jail, where Dr. Binayak Sen, general secretary of the state PUCL and a physician working on access to health for adivasis, today completed one year of imprisonment. Dr. Sen now faces a trial on charges of aiding a banned Maoist organisation, the Communist Party of India (Maoist). 1

On 5 May, Ajay was arrested at his residence at Superla in Bhilai and charged at the Bilaspur High Court under Section 124A of the Indian Penal Code (sedition) and Sections 3, 4 and 8 of the CSPSA.

Amnesty International has reason to believe that the charges against Ajay are politically motivated. Ajay has been actively engaged, since 2004, in documentation of human rights violations as part of the PUCL’s ongoing efforts to protect the rights of adivasi communitiesin the face of escalating violence in the Bastar-Dantewada area of Chattisgarh between banned Maoists and Salwa Judum, an armed anti-Maoist militia campaign widely regarded as supported by the state government. The PUCL has been instrumental in bringing to light unlawful killings of adivasis, sexual assault of adivasi women, abductions and forced displacement.

On 22 January 2008, following the arrest of a woman Maoist in Bastar-Dantewada, the Chhattisgarh police searched Ajay’s residence and seized his computer hard disk. On 26 March, Ajay filed a petition in the High Court seeking its return.

Amnesty International calls on the Union and Chattisgarh governments