Intellectuals, rights activists arrested in Indian swoop

[MenInG]

https://www.dawn.com/news/1429636/intellectuals-rights-activists-arrested-in-indian-swoop

NEW DELHI: Maharashtra police raided homes of leading intellectuals and rights activists in a nationwide swoop on Tuesday, arresting several and quizzing some more in a move that their colleagues described as “undeclared emergency”.

They said the early morning swoop by police from the Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled state was a way of diverting attention from recent revelations that a Hindu militant group was allegedly involved in the murder of writer Gauri Lankesh and other rationalists.

They said the arrest of intellectuals, lawyers, human rights defenders and writers reflected desperation in the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party that fears Prime Minister Narendra Modi could lose next year’s general elections.

Arundhati Roy sees coup against Constitution

“The simultaneous arrests are a dangerous sign of a government that fears it is losing its mandate and is falling into panic,” writer Arundhati Roy said in a statement.

“That lawyers, poets, writers, Dalit rights activists and intellectuals are being arrested on ludicrous charges while those who make up lynch mobs and threaten and murder people in broad daylight roam free, tells us very clearly where India is headed. Murderers are being honoured and protected.”

Among those arrested in Delhi was the former head of Peoples Union of Democratic Rights Gautam Navlakha. He is a regular voice for Kashmiris fighting rights abuse.

“Anybody who speaks up for justice or against Hindu majoritarianism is being made into a criminal. What is happening is absolutely perilous. In the run-up to elections, this is an attempted coup against the Indian Constitution and all the freedoms that we cherish,” Ms Roy said.

“What else is fascism if not this,” queried historian Harbans Mukhia. Tribal and women’s rights activist Sudha Bhardwaj was picked up from her home in Delhi. In some cases the police waited for pro-government TV units to arrive and film the arrests, a stan*d*ard drill under the current dispensation.

Intellectuals from across the country protested angrily. “We, the undersigned, are shocked by the serial raids across the country on the homes of activists and public intellectuals who are critical of the government and the ruling party at the Centre,” they said in a statement.

“The arrests of prominent activists and intellectuals Sudha Bharadwaj, Vernon Gonsalves, Gautam Navlakha, Varavara Rao, Arun Ferreira, Kranthi Tekula and others, are nothing but an attempt by the government to strike terror among those who are fighting for justice for the marginalised,” the statement said.

The signatories included Shehla Rashid Shora, former Vice-President, JNU Students’ Union, Mohit Pandey, former President, JNU Students’ Union, Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, Author, Journalist, Publisher, Neha Dixit, Journalist, Jignesh Mevani, Dalit MLA Vadgam, Gujarat, Sanam Sutirath Wazir, Human Rights Activist, Nakul Singh Sawhney, Documentary Filmmaker, Teesta Setalvad, Journalist and Social Activist, Harish Iyer, Equal Rights Activist, Swami Agnivesh, Arya Samaj, Social Activist, Nina Rao, Tripta Wahi and Ali Javed from Delhi University, Kuldeep Kumar, Journalist, Aban Raza, artist.

Protesting groups saw the arrests also as an attempt by the BJP to invent a false enemy and engage in scaremongering in order to polarise the 2019 elections in its favour.

“Already, the government and the media houses close to the BJP have been trying to spin a false narrative of a Maoist conspiracy since June, 2018. Terms like ‘urban naxals’ are invented in order to stifle any criticism of the government. We have learnt that the Delhi Police, after having arrested Sudha Bharadwaj, waited for Republic TV to arrive before taking her to the court. This simply shows that the arrests are incomplete without the accompanying sensationalist media propaganda to demonise activists, human rights defenders and intellectuals.”

 

[CricketCartoons]

All these artists, poets and intellectuals (because they speak english) are the manchurian candidates, planted in strategic domains and institutions and their underground network runs deep. Ruling india from their comfortable drawing rooms and conferences at 5 star hotels and being the opinion makers, telling the common folk what to think. They have been successful in raising entire generations of anti nationals, but their turf is being challenged now by a handful of resourceful patriots. HINDUSTAN is rising and they see their positions under threat, therefore maligning the proletarian movements as right wing or trolls.

 

[MenInG]

All these artists, poets and intellectuals (because they speak english) are the manchurian candidates, planted in strategic domains and institutions and their underground network runs deep. Ruling india from their comfortable drawing rooms and conferences at 5 star hotels and being the opinion makers, telling the common folk what to think. They have been successful in raising entire generations of anti nationals, but their turf is being challenged now by a handful of resourceful patriots. HINDUSTAN is rising and they see their positions under threat, therefore maligning the proletarian movements as right wing or trolls.

Sounds like a plot for next Bollywood blockbuster

 

[MP2011]

Undeclared emergency this is! BJP will rue this for sure. All this will add on to something bigger, may not immediately in next year's general elections (mostly due to fragmented opposition and not due to Modi's performance).

I mean how can an out and out murderer like Amit Shah still roaming free! In fact he wields most power after Modi.

 

[MP2011]

Lynchers are roaming freely, in fact feted by this govt while some (not kowtowing govt's line) are put behind bars even before a proper probe.

 

[cricketjoshila]

Finally action againist far leftists and on the overground supporters of the Naxals. Though i must say that the congress started the initial thrust in 2009 but had to step back as they lost politica ground and couldnot continue the actions.

These far leftists are a big threat to the country.

 

[troodon]

People like Varavara Rao who got arrested are Naxalite supporters. Good that finally some action is being taken on them.
India does not need anymore of these soft thugs who inspire people to join Naxals.

 

[enkidu_]

It's not aimed at "left wing extremism" or Naxalites, but pro-Dalit activists.

 

[cricketjoshila]

People like Varavara Rao who got arrested are Naxalite supporters. Good that finally some action is being taken on them.
India does not need anymore of these soft thugs who inspire people to join Naxals.

Most of them have been arrested and suffered jail time under congress govts also.

 

[Gabbar Singh]

It's not aimed at "left wing extremism" or Naxalites, but pro-Dalit activists.

Here comes akheR/enkidu to try and light the caste/ethnicity/race fuse again.

 

[sjahmed23]

There are soo many parallels between modi and trump. Good luck India, you're gonna need it.

 

[PakLFC]

Can't remember their name but some saffron terror group in India have been in the news recently. Police have recovered many weapons from their hide outs over the past few days. Hindustan is desperate for a civil war based on religious conflict it seems more then anything else. Heaven help them if this is what they call "rising"

 

[enkidu_]

Here comes akheR/enkidu to try and light the caste/ethnicity/race fuse again.

Instead of these silly deflections which don't suit your age, what is not caste based in Hinduism ? Do you want numbers about Dalit persecution ? On this very thread you have nothing to say about Hindu nationalists who talk of "Naxalites", while that's how it's being perceived by the principal concerned, as targeting Dalit, not Naxalite, activism. As an Indian you should know about the whole "urban Naxal" meme used by Hindtuvadis to silence dissent.

One such article :

Dawn raids on Dalit activists citing 'Maoist' links indicate desperate attempt to secure Hindutva vote bank

Dawn raids by Pune Police personnel across seven cities have resulted in the arrest or detention of five rights activists, who have been accused variously of being ‘urban Maoists’ and the ‘overground’ faces of the ultra-Left underground. However, as this copy was being written, the Supreme Court gave some interim relief to the held activists and said that the police cannot keep them in jail but under house arrest till 6 September.

A brief look at the background of the activists targeted by the Pune Police would be instructive. From Hyderabad was Varavara Rao, a Left revolutionary who has been in and out of jail since the 1970s; he was an emissary in talks between the Central government and the Maoists in the early 2000s (that is, under both the Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh government). From Delhi was Gautam Navlakha, a former journalist and one of the most recognisable representatives of the Peoples Union for Democratic Rights; from Faridabad, the police picked up Sudha Bharadwaj, a lawyer and tribal rights activist; from Mumbai they picked up Vernon Gonsalves, an academic, lawyer and activist, who was in jail on suspicion of being a Maoist, but was acquitted in all cases he had been embroiled in; and from Thane was arrested Arun Ferreira, also a lawyer and rights activist, who had been in jail for six years as an undertrial on charges of being a Maoist.

Tellingly, the Delhi High Court threw out the Pune Police’s plea for transit remand and ordered Navlakha remain under house arrest until the case is disposed of, while the prayer for transit remand in Bharadwaj’s case was first granted by a Faridabad court despite being stayed by the Punjab and Haryana High Court. The Faridabad court later stayed the remand till 30 August. The Delhi High Court pointed to infirmities in the procedures adopted by the police.

Several aspects of these simultaneous raids (also carried out in Goa and Ranchi) and arrests suggest that it is part of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) strategy to consolidate upper caste Hindu and ultra-nationalistic vote banks with difficult elections impending in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan this year, followed by Lok Sabha elections next year along with elections to a host of Legislative Assemblies, including, crucially, elections in Maharashtra, where the party is not on a good wicket at all.

The police say that they have evidence linking all the five with five people arrested earlier this year – Sudhir Dhawale (activist), Surendra Gadling (advocate,) Mahesh Raut (activist), Shoma Sen (professor and activist) and Rona Wilson (activist) – in connection with violence in Bhima Koregaon (Maharashtra), where Dalit groups celebrated a nineteenth-century battle in which a colonial Mahar (Dalit) regiment had defeated a Maratha army. The forensic spotlight had originally fallen on Hindutva activists Milind Ekbote and Sambhaji Bhide, who had made inflammatory speeches before the event. Ekbote had been arrested and released on bail, while Bhide, a sort of eminence grise in Sangh Parivar circles, counting amongst his admirers Prime Minister Narendra Modi, was never arrested at all, despite the Supreme Court having ordered it.

Curiously, the police then abandoned their case against Ekbote, Bhide and other saffron merchants and focused attention on Dalit activists, who have been promoted to the position of prime agents provocateurs inciting the violence in which one person was killed. While Marathas had accused Dalits of having attacked them, the latter had said that crowds carrying saffron flags had orchestrated attacks on them. Clearly, some charges are more equal than others.

To return to the current situation, some things stand out. One, the Dalits and those who work amongst them remain targets (and not beneficiaries) of the current regime. The Central government was more or less stampeded into introducing and passing the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Amendment Bill, 2018, earlier this month to nullify a Supreme Court ruling which many felt had diluted the original act. The Central government had barely reacted to the Supreme Court ruling. Subsequently, the pressure had started building up. Many Dalit MPs and ministers had approached the government seeking action. Among them was Lok Sabha member Udit Raj. Key allies Ramvilas Paswan of the Lok Janshakti Party and Upendra Khushwaha of the Rashtriya Lok Samata Party also pressured the government to counter this dilution. The latter had threatened to part company with the National Democratic Alliance, and, according to recent reports, is still mindful of entering into an alliance with the Rashtriya Janata Dal.

The catalyst for all these were the countrywide protests against the Supreme Court order organised by Dalit groups on 2 April. Eleven people were killed, many more injured and public property destroyed in the protests. No one had anticipated this scale of violence. With another Bharat bandh that was scheduled for 9 August, and the pressure continuing to build, the Modi government finally introduced and passed the amendment bill on 3 and 6 August. The bandh was called off much to the relief of the BJP and its governments at the Centre and in various states, some of which had also called for action.

But, clearly, the anti-Dalit sentiment is hardwired into the Sangh Parivar make up, with its unreconstructed upper caste biases surfacing every now and then. The shifting of blame unilaterally to the Dalits in the Bhima Koregaon case is just one more piece of evidence. The desperate attempt to entwine Dalit activism, which is not proscribed, with sympathy for or involvement with the Communist Party of India (Maoist), which is banned, seems to be a classic upper caste backlash against growing Dalit assertion. It could well derail the current regime’s efforts to win Dalit support and prove electorally counter-productive. Activist and author Arundhati Roy does not necessarily get it right all the time, but she seems to have nailed it when she said the dawn raids on 28 August were a desperate sign ‘of a government that fears it is losing its mandate’.

Second, as we have already noted, this seems to be an electoral gambit. How far the ‘consolidation’ of the Hindutva vote bank will compensate for a possible consolidation of Dalit sentiments against the BJP remains to be seen, but given the shift away from the ruling party, which is proceeding apace on the back of, amongst other things, mismanagement of the economy, the opposition has reason to be optimistic, if it manages to stick together.

Third, there are enough grounds to speculate about whether this sudden crackdown on ‘Maoists’ is to compensate for wholesale arrests of Sanatan Sanstha members in relation to the murders of journalist Gauri Lankesh, rationalist Narendra Dabholkar and others. The government has not been able to protect them because the Central Bureau of Investigation, building on the work done by the special investigation team of the Karnataka Police, has unearthed a critical mass of evidence. Hindutva sentiments have been aroused, as demonstrated by the support shown for many of those arrested in these cases. This could well be the BJP’s way of sending out the ‘right’ message.

Much of the foregoing is, as it has to be, in the realm of speculation. It is now up to the judiciary to protect the rights of those arrested now and earlier. The Chhattisgarh government had arrested eminent physician and activist Binayak Sen and kept him in jail for two years until the Supreme Court bailed him out in 2009. The Chhattisgarh government hasn’t proceeded with the case since. Justice could still be done and seen to be done, especially if Bhide is arrested in accordance with the Supreme Court’s orders.

https://www.firstpost.com/india/daw...mpt-to-secure-hindutva-vote-bank-5071601.html

 

[Pakistanian]

RIP democracy, India is turning into North Korea.

 

[MP2011]

Can't remember their name but some saffron terror group in India have been in the news recently. Police have recovered many weapons from their hide outs over the past few days. Hindustan is desperate for a civil war based on religious conflict it seems more then anything else. Heaven help them if this is what they call "rising"

Sanatan Dharma Sanstha.

 

[MP2011]

So many lynchers roaming freely, so many of Modi's own party (Adityanath, Balyan etc) facing riot/manslaughter cases, yet no one dares to touch them. In fact, UP govt has taken initiative to close al those cases.

As I said, BJP will pay a big political price for this action which is taken under the garb of nationalism, yet again. However there is a limit to how much nationalism ordinary people can gulp down. All this will come back to bite Modi's ***, big time!

 

[MP2011]

Problem of Modi is that he doesn't have any achievements to show to his electorate regarding development.

Rupee is in ICU for so long, Petro prices have been at their lifetime highest, India's foreign relations with almost everyone are in dumps, demonetization has proved to be the biggest scam ever, much touted GST, launched with great fanfare is a big failure, no jobs whatsoever for country's youth, communal harmony has gone for a toss ever since he took over, Aadhar fiasco, the list is endless.

No wonder he has to raise the bogey of anti nationalism every now and then and his gullible electorate fall for it every single time but for how long?

 

[CricketCartoons]

So many lynchers roaming freely, so many of Modi's own party (Adityanath, Balyan etc) facing riot/manslaughter cases, yet no one dares to touch them. In fact, UP govt has taken initiative to close al those cases.

As I said, BJP will pay a big political price for this action which is taken under the garb of nationalism, yet again. However there is a limit to how much nationalism ordinary people can gulp down. All this will come back to bite Modi's ***, big time!

if Modi ji will pay big political price, then it means these people who are crying victimhood are very strong and influential.

This is what we love about Modi Ji. he puts the interest of the nation above petty ambitions like appeasing everyone to stay in power. This man is something else. India hasn't seen such an able administrator since alamgeer aurangzeb.

 

[Abdullah719]

Activists’ arrest: No curb on people's democratic rights, says Rajnath Singh

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh allayed fears Saturday on any curb on democratic rights in the wake of the recent arrest of human rights activists, assuring "there will not be any effort to compress the pressure cooker".

"I want to clarify there will never be any effort to compress the pressure cooker. All have the right to speak, do whatever they want in democracy but no one will be allowed to destabilise the country or create violence," he said at an event here.

Singh was answering a query on the Supreme Court's comments that "Dissent is the safety valve of democracy. If you don't allow the safety valve pressure cooker will burst".

The apex court had said this while hearing a plea on the arrest of five activists under an anti-terror law on charges of indulging in Left wing extremism.

"Our government is committed to upholding democratic values, see the record of those arrested. In 2012, too many of them were arrested and at that time also similar allegations were raised," he said at the 'Hindustan Shikhar Samagam'.

"Any effort to destabilise any government, taking refuge in one's ideology for promoting violence, conspiring to destabilise and break the country, I feel there cannot be a bigger crime than this," he stressed.

Claiming that his government has been successful in checking Naxalism, he said the number of Left Wing Extremism affected districts has come down.

"Now they (Naxals) are adopting different measures, working in urban areas and influencing people with their ideology. They want to do violence in urban areas. I have got inputs from my agencies," Singh said.

https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/n...ocratic-rights-says-rajnath-singh/646215.html