Basics of Human Rights
Basics of Human Rights
Topics issues: the UN Convention against Torture, preventing discrimination and violence against women and girls, members of religious minorities, and Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, caste-based discrimination prevention of religious violence and measures to avoid excessive use of force by security officers.
religious violence, arbitrary deprivation of nationality, indigenous peoples’ rights and women’s rights. Laws that discriminate against Muslims and LGBTI community, such as the Citizenship (Amendment) Act and Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act.
freedom of expression and assembly, human rights defenders,attacks against journalists and human rights defenders, , right to health, right to privacy. laws that threaten the rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly, such as the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act and Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules,
right to health, right to privacy, religious violence, arbitrary deprivation of nationality, indigenous peoples’ rights and women’s rights.
the national and state human rights commissions and the increasing dilution of their powers and independence.
कफ़ील खान का केस कप्पन के मामले में दोहराया जा रहा है । Navin Kumar https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0rQzHJUWEs Sep 13, 2022 दो साल बाद मिली थी ज़मानत। अब कब बाहर आएंगे कोई नहीं जानता। लोग पूछ रहे हैं ये मुसलमान होने की सज़ा नहीं तो और क्या है? परिवार और बौद्धिक बिरादरी को झटका।
In the infamous Kannagi Murugesan Honour Killing case, a caste Hindu girl Kannagi and her Dalit / SC husband Murugesan were killed on 8th July, 2003 in a blood curdling manner for marrying out of her caste. The Special Court (or the Principal Sessions Court) Cuddalore district sentenced the brother of the girl to death sentence and awarded life imprisonment to her father and 9 other people. In an unusual manner, 2 senior police officers were also convicted by the trial court for life imprisonment for sec. 3(2)(1) and 4 of the SC & ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
The Madras High Court today, 8th June, 2022, commuted the Death Penalty imposed on the brother of deceased Kannagi and imposed Life Sentence. The HC Confirmed the conviction and life sentence imposed on her father and 7 other persons belonging to her same caste. 2 Convicted persons were acquitted.
Of the 2 police officers convicted by the trial court, the then SI of Police was acquitted of committing offences u/s 3(2)(1) of the SC/ST Act under which life sentence was imposed and sec. 218 IPC under which 3 years RI was imposed. However the conviction u/s 217 IPC of 2 years and conviction u/s 4 of the SC/ST Act (Police Officer is to be held guilty for not using the powers to register complaint) of 1 year were sustained.
The Conviction and life sentence on the 2nd police officer, the senior of the 2 officials ho was a DySP at the time of his retirement, were sustained.
This judgment is a very important victory for Dalit justice and rule of law.
Police officials are seldom punished for mistreating Dalits. The confirmation of conviction u/s 3(2)(1) and life imprisonment awarded to the DySP is perhaps for the first time in India, or amongst the few instances known. Conviction u/s 4 SC/ST Act is also unknown. SO in that sense it is a major steo forward to ensure justice for victims of honour killing.
I had appeared for the family of Murugesan, the Dalit person killed for daring to marry a caste Hindu girl. After consulting with the family of the deceased Murugesan, I informed the court that the family had instructed me that they were not pressing for confirmation of the death sentence and would be satisfied with confirmation of conviction and award of life sentence.
I was actually very humbled by the response of the father of Murugesan, a landless Dalit person economically very poor when I asked him about the death sentence. He spontaneously responded in very rustic Tamil, "Ayya, (respectful address, in Tamil) I have lost my son and daughter in law to the most brutal killing arising from caste poison and hatred; they are not going to come alive because the killers are going to be hanged. I can imagine the pain of the family whose member will be hanged because of the death sentence. Let them not suffer that pain of permanent departure. The person and his family have already paid the price because of conviction and imprisonment. I don't want more blood to be spilt".
I wonder, how many of us will have this generosity of spirit !!
At the risk of sounding prescriptive, there are a number of very progressive provisions in the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989, which are very useful to get social justice. But they are not known to many lawyers, let alone other human rights activists.
We, in the PUCL should organise a series of workshops to educate our members and activists of other movements on the unique provisions of the SC/ST (POA) Act and on how to access the various protections given in this law to protect, promote and defend the rights of Dalits and tribals. For example the provision of state giving compensation on the filing of a FIR under the law, in instalments from the time of filing FIR, Final Report/ Charge Sheet, Trial and judgment is UNIQUE as compensation is delinked from the trial court judgment; this is in recognition that trials are not in the hands of victims and so they need to get compensation at the beginning itself.
The POA Act also has provisions for appointment of lawyers of choice of the victims. There are other very unique provisions also.
Suresh, PUCL.
Only law-abiding citizens can claim fundamental rights: Supreme Court May 25 2022 http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/91774998.cms
A bench of Justices Dinesh Maheshwari and Aniruddha Bose last week ruled that "any claim towards fundamental rights cannot be justifiably made without the person concerned himself adhering to and submitting to the process of law."
Though this ruling came in a case where an accused, who had challenged invocation of anti-gangster law MCOCA by Maharashtra government, the general nature of the ruling by the court has far reaching spill over implications on a whole gamut of cases.
Demolition, Bulldozer, Law & Empathy | बुल्डोज़र, क़ानून और अन्याय का एहसास https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2H_TrXRvkM Apr 22, 2022 Faizan Mustafa's Legal Awareness Web series: LAW's
"Worst Form Of Violence By State": Lawyer In Delhi Demolition Case Apr 21, 2022 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJY8nHQcsbY
On a day the Supreme Court heard the petition against the demolitions in Delhi's Jahangirpuri, the lawyer for the victims, Dushyant Dave, tells NDTV that this is the worst form of violence by a state on its citizens, the demolitions were illegal and that the principles of natural justice should have been followed.
Bulldozers in Jahangirpuri | Future of Justice in India? | Akash Banerjee https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rtCiYOCfY2g Apr 21, 2022 The Deshbhakt
The Bulldozer Politics of the Govt. is almost a policy now against any voices of dissent & towards a particular community. The provocation by a mob in Jahangirpuri and the unfortunate violence after that has seen Bulldozer Politics being unleashed in the capital. But on the contrary can bulldozers be used for good - for construction and not destruction?
Rakesh Tikait on Jahangirpuri Bulldozer: जल्द होगा बुलडोजर और ट्रैक्टर में मुकाबला ।Quint Hindi https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttpi0QWnjUM Apr 22, 2022 Quint Hindi
Rakesh Tikait on Jahangirpuri Bulldozer: दिल्ली के जहांगीरपुरी में बुलडोजर की कार्यवाही को लेकर भारतीय किसान यूनियन के राष्ट्रीय प्रवक्ता चौधरी राकेश टिकैत ने बड़ा बयान देते हुए कहां है कि जिस तरह से एक धर्म विशेष के लोगों के ऊपर बुलडोजर की कार्यवाही की जा रही है वह हिंदुस्तान के आने वाले भविष्य के लिए बेहद खराब है.
the powerful state legislatures in the US have passed bills regulating and banning areas of academic discussion such as the critical race theory.
Similarly, in India, university matters pertaining to syllabus, appointments and resignations of vice-chancellors, professors in different universities have been accused of being done under political influence in recent years, says a report. The University Grants Commission’s (UGC) new syllabus for history also faced charges of saffronisation and distortion by historians, as per a report.
In the wake of the anti-CAA-NRC movement in India, the students, teachers and officials of Jamia Millia Islamia, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Aligarh Muslim University, Jadavpur University, University of Delhi and other higher education institutions were similarly attacked, either by the police or by the political outfits affiliated with the current ruling party.
“The frequency and global reach of these attacks should be alarming, not only to those in higher education but to society at large. These attacks demonstrate a shrinking of the space for free inquiry and discourse…We must reject violence aimed at punishing ideas, protect threatened scholars and students, and champion the freedom to think,” said Clare Robinson, SAR’s advocacy director.
For Link to Full report and excerpts from the report: http://emeets.lnwr.in/index.php/1726-report-of-the-scholars-at-risk-academic-freedom-monitoring-project
Free to Think 2021: Report of the Scholars at Risk Academic Freedom Monitoring Project https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Scholars-at-Risk-Free-to-Think-2021.pdf ..Free to Think 2021 documents 332 attacks on higher education communities in 65 countries and territories.... Around the world, higher education communities are overwhelmed by frequent attacks on scholars, students, staff, and their institutions... Ultimately, they impact all of us, by damaging higher education’s unique capacity to drive the social, political, cultural, and economic development from which we all benefit. ... In India, authorities are prosecuting more than a dozen scholars and students under the country’s anti-terrorism laws, in an apparent act of retaliation against their expression and views critical of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his administration.
Scholars at Risk calls on states, higher education communities, and civil society around the world to respond to these attacks: to reject violence and coercion aimed at restricting inquiry and expression; to protect threatened scholars, students, and higher education institutions; and to reaffirm publicly their commitment to academic freedom and support for the principles that critical discourse is not disloyalty, that ideas are not crimes, and that everyone must be free to think, question, and share their ideas.
Chapter: Academic Freedom and Its Protection Under International Law https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Scholars-at-Risk-Free-to-Think-2021.pdf#page=15
At the international level, protections for academic freedom begin within the documents collectively known as the International Bill of Human Rights:
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), and the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). Specifically, ICCPR Article 19(2) protects the right of everyone to hold opinions without interference and:
the freedom to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of [one’s] choice.
The United Nations (UN) Human Rights Committee has stated that the right includes teaching and public commentary by researchers.1
y, UNESCO’s 1997 Recommendation concerning the Status of Higher-Education Teaching Personnel (RSHETP) articulates academic freedom to include, among other things, the freedom of teaching and discussion, freedom in carrying out research and disseminating and publishing the results thereof, freedom [of higher education personnel to express freely their opinion about the institution or
system in which they work, freedom from institutional censorship and freedom to participate in professional or representative academic bodies.4
India is bound by national and international legal instruments that provide protections for academic freedom. India is a party to international human rights instruments including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which provides for freedom of opinion and expression (Article 19), and the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), which provides for the right to education (Article 13) and calls on state parties to “respect the freedom indispensable for scientific research and creative activity” ( http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-URL_ID=13144&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html )
As discussed in Free to Think 2020, cuts to internet service in Jammu and Kashmir, which began in August 2019 following the revocation that month of its special administrative status, continued to negatively impact academic activity. A proposal to revise existing guidelines on civil servants’ participation in international online events also threatened to restrict scholars’ freedom to engage with their peers around the world. ..A number of scholars and students remain in state custody or under investigation for their expression, views, and associations. These include Anand
Teltumbde, Asif Iqbal Tanha, Devangana Kalita, Gokarakonda Naga (G.N.) Saibaba, Hany Babu, Meeran Haider, Natasha Narwal, Rona Wilson, Safoora Zargar, Sharjeel Imam, Shoma Sen, and Varavara Rao. Most of these scholars and students have been accused of violating the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), a law purportedly intended to prevent acts of terrorism and other national security threats, but that has frequently been used to punish and silence human rights activists, political opposition, and other expression or activities the government finds displeasing.
Higher education institutions retaliated against scholars through suspensions and other pressures. On January 7, 2021, Visva-Bharati University (VBU) suspended economics professor Sudipta
Bhattacharyya, in apparent retaliation for his expression critical of a hiring decision at VBU and his inquiry into a conversation the vice-chancellor claimed to have had with the renowned economist Amartya Sen.21
On May 17, the Central University of Kerala (CUK) suspended Gilbert Sebastian, an assistant professor in the Department of International Relations, for describing the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a Hindu-nationalist organization connected to India’s ruling party, as a “proto-fascist” group.23 Sebastian allegedly said this during a virtual session of a course he teaches on
“fascism and Nazism,” during which he also allegedly referred to other political figures and governments that could be considered examples of proto-fascists, including the Spanish general Francisco Franco and the apartheid government of South Africa.
Pratap Bhanu Mehta, a political scientist and the vice-chancellor of Ashoka University from 2017 to 2019, wrote in a resignation that he was considered by the university’s founders to be a “political liability,” apparently due to his writings, saying “My public writing in support of a politics that tries to honour constitutional values of freedom and equal respect for all citizens is perceived to carry risks for the university.”
General Data Protection Regulation: the online guide to the EU GDPR https://www.i-scoop.eu/gdpr/
More rights to data subjects and comes with more and further-reaching consequences for data controllers (who decide on the purpose and way of processing personal data) and data processors (who conduct processing activities on behalf of controllers).
To check this webpage: http://www.eugdpr.org/the-regulation.html
Polavaram rehab colonies lack basic facilities: Somu https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Visakhapatnam/polavaram-rehab-colonies-lack-basic-facilities-somu/article35332908.ece July 15, 2021 officials claim that 76% of the project has been completed. But only 22% of Relief and Rehabilitation (R&R) package is distributed. the evacuees have been requesting the government to take up the project only after providing the complete R&R package, compensation and also completing the construction of houses.
‘Only 4% of Polavaram evacuees rehabilitated’ https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/andhra-pradesh/only-4-of-polavaram-evacuees-rehabilitated/article34306597.ece T. Appala Naidu April 13, 2021
about 53% of the total 5.8 lakh the Polavaram project oustees are tribals.
“By April, only 4,000 of the more than 1.5 lakh affected families have been rehabilitated. The Andhra Pradesh High Court has mandated the completion of the rehabilitation and resettlement process on par with the construction of the project. However, the State government appears to be preparing to force the oustees to leave their habitation without compensating them,”