Human Rights Defenders Data Information Knowledge Solidarity

Ravi Kiran Jain is no more. A lot of us might not know who Ravi Kiran Jain was.
A former head of the PUCL, Ravi ji was an extremely kindred soul. He worked alongside Dr. Binayak Sen, Sudha Bharadwaj and Kavita Shrivastava in the PUCL.
When Justice Sudhir Agrawal of the Allahabad High Court, (the Ayodhya judgement case judge) wrote a letter to the Bar, suggesting that judges and senior advocates make contribution to help hapless lawyers during corona virus days, he as PUCL national president, publicly responded, saying that first this judge should give up his unnecessary Z-plus security (after the kind of judgement he had given), and secondly, he said, these days clients instead of  engaging Senior Advocates prefer to engage kith and kin of Judges practicing in high court. 
It embarrassed many 'uncle judges' no end. 

Fond of quoting HM Seervai at length, he was the stuff the quest for justice in an unequal world is made of. No flag will fly at half mast, but his demise is nevertheless a huge loss, the kind which should be mourned in the recesses of our souls. 

A lot of warriors for justice do not get the sort of headlines that some receive. Would we see gushing elegies in the papers? -- A Whats App Post.

 Statement by Campaign Against State Repression: Facts: In the early morning of  December 15, Ambedkarite Activist Somnath had chest pain and died in police custody. He had been arrested after a protest against desecration of a replica of Constitution in Parbhani District of Maharashtra. Medical examination found that there were internal and external injuries on his body, suggesting custodial torture.

Before the protests a replica of the Constitution was desecrated in Parbhani district in Maharashtra  on December 10, International Human Rights Day. After the desecration, a call of bandh was given by some organisations in Parbhani to condemn  Maharashtra police's act of shielding the perpetrators by declaring them as “mentally deranged”. After the protest on December 11, the police registered 8 FIRs against 50 Known and Unknown people and started combing operations in nearby Dalit Bastis, Bhim Nagar and Priyadarshini Nagar, brutally beating men and  women. Those arrested by the police were sent to judicial custody without medical examination,.. 

The CASR says that ..Similar events unfolded in 2018, Elgaar Parishad program at Bhima Koregaon memorial where Brahmanical Hindutva forces attacked the masses gathered to oppose the "New Peshwai" in the form of Brahmanical Hindutva Fascism of RSS-BJP. Instead of arresting the attackers, police raided the poor Dalit Bastis and unleashed brutality to suppress the anti-fascist vision of the oppressed and exploited people. Repression continued in the form of an attack on democratic progressive forces under the pretext of "Urban Naxalism", later known as Bhima Koregaon 16,

Somnath belongs to the Waddar community that is listed as denotified tribes by the government. These communities are treated by the Indian state as habitual offenders and  Police simply pick them up and send them behind bars, whenever any kind of criminal offense happens in the areas near their bastis.

I

Elgar Parishad case: NIA arrests activists Sagar Gorkhe, Ramesh Gaichor  https://scroll.in/latest/972501/elgar-parishad-case-nia-arrests-activists-sagar-gorkhe-ramesh-gaichor In a video recorded before their arrest, the activists alleged the NIA was forcing them to give statements to implicate those arrested in the case. Sep 08, 2020