NEW DELHI: The Progressive International has urged the Centre to stop persecuting non-violent protesters, immediately release the incarcerated activists and drop the cases against them. “Two major criminal investigations in India are a serious cause for concern because they appear to be driven by a partisan, political agenda.
The use of the investigating agencies to target dissenting political ideologies in India has been a disturbing trend. The two separate cases of the Delhi riots 2020 and the Bhima-Koregaon incident 2018, have cast a wide net and included public figures known for their decades of social, political and democratic work being criminalised and accused under anti-terror and national security laws,” a statement released by the organisation said.
The statement, signed by eminent personalities from India and abroad including Aruna Roy, Arundhati Roy, Noam Chomsky, Jean Drèze, Cornel West, Vijay Prashad and Sarika Sinha, points out that a majority of the arrested persons are from the Muslim community.
“Also targeted are human rights and civil rights activists who may oppose policies of the government, including issues of discrimination and persecution of minorities by the ruling dispensation. These include Member of the Council of Progressive International Harsh Mander, Professor Apoorvanand of the University of Delhi, Yogendra Yadav, well-known intellectual and political activist, and others,” the statement said.
According to the statement, many activists in the Bhima-Koregaon case including poet Varavara Rao, Sudha Bhardwaj, Anand Teltumbde and Gautam Navlakha have been unjustly prosecuted. “They are among the many other activists who have been in custody under false and untenable charges,” it said.
Saying that the conduct of the government was unacceptable in the international framework for protection of human rights and the Indian Constitution, the organisation urged the NDA government to repeal and halt the use of “draconian” anti-terror and national security laws against democratic dissenters and activists and also repeal the Citizenship (Amendment) Act.