Civil Liberties Monitoring Committee (CLMC) on the occasion of five years of Makkah Masjid bomb blast and subsequent police firing, pay homage to the Martyrs and express its solidarity with the family of victims of bomb terror and police terror. This committee expresses its grief and sorrow on the conditions of victims and their families and also expresses concern over the negligence of government and inaction by the investigating agencies. It seems that the government and investigating agencies are not serious to investigate this case instead are behaving in biased manner. If carefully examined the Makkah Masjid bomb blast, subsequent police firing and the other bomb blasts in the country it can be said that there is something suspicious that is being shielded and the real culprits are being protected. By this the fact comes out that the investigating agencies are not serious and insincere.

CLMC strongly feel that the blasts that took place in Hyderabad at some or the point has nexus between a group of Hindutva police officers and Hindutva organizations. Actually the blasts that took place in Hyderabad were the part of greater conspiracy hatched by Hindutva elements present in the government and non-government agencies There is a reason to believe on this because immediately after the blast at Makkah Masjid, police opened fire on the Muslims who were helping the victims of the blast and also blamed the Muslims for the blast which is reported in the secret report of police. In this report it is mentioned that because of the differences between Ahle Hadees and Sunnatul Jamaat, Ahle Hadees people targeted Sunnatul Jamaat people through bomb blast. Police department registered two FIRs of Makkah Masjid bomb blast. One case was handed over to CBI and another case was retained by the Hyderabad police.

By taking the advantage of blast and on the name of investigation, police started picking hundreds and hundreds of Muslim youths, illegally detained and tortured mercilessly. Police forced the Muslim youths to say “Hey Ram” and disrespect the Holy quran and commented on religion Islam in insulting manner and forced them to take the responsibility of blasts. They propagated through media that Muslim youths have taken the responsibility of bomb blasts. They also disclosed the tampered recordings of Narco analysis test to the media. This clearly reflects the intentions of the investigation agency as they wanted to divert the blast investigation so that many aims can be fulfilled with a single shot. This may be to divert the attention from Sohrabuddin encounter, to bring down the morale of Muslim community, so that they cannot live with human dignity etc. Muslim leaders completely failed to tackle the situation and become defensive in this issue and the Hindutva terrorists succeeded in their aims initially. Due to the continuous pressure from the Muslim community, secular forces and the self confidence of Muslim youths the Hindutva terrorists did not succeed. Now the real terrorists have been exposed as well. All these terrorists belong to RSS gang.

Civil Liberties Committee strongly condemns the dual standard of the government. . The police officers those who were involved in implicating the Muslim youths have been rewarded with awards and promoted to higher post .Ramchandran and Harish Kumar Gupta who are actually responsible for the torture of Muslim youths, are today at the higher positions. The government is shielding the tainted police officers in the courts by appointing top most lawyers. The state government has dumped the State Minority Commission’s Advocate Ravichander report in which it is clearly mentioned that police torture took place and recommended that the tainted police officers should be punished, measures should be taken to build the confidence of Muslim community, 24 hours help line should be provided and the complaints should be heard and recorded by the chief secretary of Andhra Pradesh government. Instead of implementing the recommendations of Advocate Ravichander’s report, the government has dismissed the State Minority Commission itself. In fact, to get rid of implementing these recommendations, the government has tendered apology to Muslim community. By giving meagre amount on the name of compensation, it wants to cool down the emotions of Muslims, but don’t want to take any action against police officers because government it self depend on these police officers as they belongs to right wing group.

This committee wants to say that giving meagre amount on the name of compensation is not justice. Justice should be based on equity. Even after the completion of 5 years of Makkah Masjid bomb blast, the government has not taken any measures to provide justice. The demand of justice is that first of all government should close all the cases registered against Muslim youths in connection of blasts in the year 2007 (these cases are still open) Advocate Ravichander’s report should be presented in the Assembly and its recommendations should be implemented immediately. Tainted police officers should be punished, measures should be taken for the rehabilitation of Muslim youths, and the government should withdraw the advocates who are appointed to defend the tainted police officers in the courts.

On the completion of five years of Makkah Masjid bomb blast, Civil Liberties Monitoring Committee demands the Muslim ruling class to come into consciousness at least now and pressurize the government to present Advocate Ravichander’s report in the Assembly, it is a matter of great concern that even the MLA’s belongs to Muslim community or Congress,TDP,TRS,CPI,CPM,etc didn’t raised this issue in the assembly, this committee condemn the reckless attitude of political parties. Civil Liberties Committee wants to make it clear that the links of all the bomb blasts that took place in the country are connected with the Makkah Masjid bomb blast. For this purpose, the investigation should be done immediately in the greater interest of national security.

Civil Liberties Monitoring Committee on this occasion demands the Prime Minister of India to intervene into the situation and monitor the investigation of Makkah Masjid as the state government completely failed to full its responsibility. Victims are denied justice; therefore justice should be done as soon as possible. Advocate Ravichander’s report should be presented in the Assembly and implemented immediately.  Immediate measures should be taken to curb the Hindutva terrorism.

Noted civil rights activist Shabnam Hashmi has written to Congress president Sonia Gandhi regarding brutal attack on a Muslim youth by Mumbai police for unintentionally crossing a traffic signal.

Bilal Abdul Qadir Sheikh was brutally thrashed by four Bhiwandi Police personnel in Mumbai for crossing a traffic signal on May 2. While assaulting him they passed communal remarks against Bilal.

He suffered serious injuries and was admitted to Rajmukhi hospital in Mulund where he underwent life saving surgeries.

Bilal was discharged from the ICU on May 14 with doctors’ advice to take complete rest for four weeks.

However, his troubles did not end here, he was sent to the 14-days judicial custody on Wednesday by a Mumbai court on false charges leveled against him by the traffic police.

Shabnam Hashmi, along with Bilal’s brother met Maharashtra chief minister Prithviraj Chavan on May 14 seeking action against the accused policemen. But, nothing has been done in this regard yet.

Here is the full text of Ms Hashmi’s letter to Sonia Gandhi:

Dear Mrs. Gandhi,

Bilal a young man was brutally attacked by Bhiwandi police on May 2, 2012 for crossing a signal. he offered to pay the fine as it was his mistake. The policeman took out the key from his motorcycle, dragged him by holding his caller, used highly abusive and communal language and then joined by three more brutally attacked him constantly using communal abuses against him. His shoulder and right hand joint broke, the joint ball came out. He had to spend days in ICU.

I came to know about this on May 9th, immediately raised it with media and some Mumbai based leaders. Met the Chief Minister on May 14th with Bilal’s brother Dr Salim and Mr. Yusuf Abrahani . We showed him the x ray of Bilal told him the fact that he will never fully recover but probably 90%. He said he will talk to the Police commissioner I don’t think he ever did.

DCP, ACP OF Bhiwandi had met Bilal in hospital a few days before this meeting past midnight and threatened him to compromise as he will not get anything by fighting.

Despite talking to everyone in media, senior political leaders ( and I happen to know quite a few), meeting the CM, the police has shown its all power and have against doctor’s advise of two weeks complete rest, Bilal was sent to jail by putting charges against him, while the four policemen roam free.

Looking back I think it was our foolishness to advise him to fight against injustice because one should stop thinking that minorities, Dalits, Adivasis & poor can ever get justice .

With every day and with every case the minorities are loosing faith in all the promises given by UPA. Your being very secular or Dr Manmohan Singh being very ‘nice’ does not help those who are hounded , tortured , beaten up , demonised every day. The Institutional bias has only increased because Dr Manmohan Singh did not want to be vindictive.

Cleansing the system and removing the institutional bias and removing communal cadre, sensitizing them is following the Indian Constitution and not being ‘vindictive’.  UPA has allowed highly communal elements to penetrate very deep at every level.

What all should we forget? Batla House, Kazmi, Bilal, hundreds of boys who have been tortured, encountered?

Shabnam

In the middle of April 2012 Osmania University (OU) witnessed an unusual violence on the issue of eating beef. A section of dalit students’ were demanding that University Hostels should have beef on the menu. They also organized a beef festival in which a large number of students ate beef biryani. The festivity was not to last long as the ABVP, the student wing of RSS, created rampage, a student was knifed, a bus was torched and ruckus was created in the university. The Vice Chancellor of OU knelt to the aggressive cow protectors and said that beef will not be introduced in the menu.

Just a month ago the in the Kurmaguda area of Hyderabad a group of youth associated with Hindu communal group were arrested for throwing beef inside a Hanuman temple, who later spread the word that Muslims have defiled our temple and turned their guns against the hapless minority, torched few buses. A little while ago the ruling BJP government in Madhya Pradesh had introduced a bill prohibiting the consumption of beef in the state. Other BJP ruled states in one form or the other are introducing legislations, which prohibit the slaughter of cow.

The place where Muslims were butchered mercilessly under the Chief mastership of Modi the ‘care of cow’ has gone one step up and state has opened centers for cataract and dental surgery of the Mother Cow. The goal of the Hindu state of Gujarat under Modi is to open more such centers so that Mother cow does not have to travel more than three kilometers for accessing these services, this while innumerable victims of Gujarat carnage, are yet to recover from the trauma of the carnage, aided by the apathy of state.

So far most of these legislations and the accompanying propaganda have been directed primarily against Muslim minority, which is demonized as the butchers and eaters of ‘our holy cow’. The OU episode shows the other side of the agenda of cow politics. While there had been cases of murders of dalits on the pretext of skinning a dead cow (Jhajjar, Haryana) and VHP defending the act saying that cow is too holy to spare the dalits. Still primarily it is the Muslim community which has been the target of propaganda emanating from RSS- Combine stable.

With dalits, the other target of RSS combine, the issue is not just of identity. It is related to the livelihood and food habits of dalits-Adivasis. The cow as a symbol of RSS combine has been in the fore since the rise of communal politics during the British rule. As such the cow has been in the forefront of communal battles of upper castes in India earlier also. The Brahmanical reaction to rise of Buddhism was countered by putting forward the symbol of cow. Some Dalit scholars hold that cow was cleverly chosen and one of the reasons cow stole a march over the equally useful buffalo was its color. It is not a coincidence that the dark skinned people have faced the wrath of the elite in one form or the other.

The scholars of Vedic India Prof D.N.Jha, Dr. Pandurang Vaman Kane and champion of social justice Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, all have pointed out that cow was verily eaten during Vedic period. With the rise of agricultural society, and need for preserving cattle wealth; the religions-ideologies promoting non-violence in the form of Jainism and Buddhism came up and campaigned against senseless sacrifice of cow in Vedic yagnas (sacrificial ritual).

The current communal politics has twin agenda. At surface it wants to subjugate the minorities and is using the emotive issues to create a mass hysteria against minorities. Lord Ram and Cow are the major tools of communal political mobilization. While the supporters of RSS combine generously donate for the welfare of cow, it is the dalits who practically take care of the grazing and other needs of Holy mother. Last some time a pressure is being built up culturally and politically that beef eating communities give up this integral part of their habit.

The food patterns are changing under intense propaganda still as of now the consumption of beef in India is higher than that of mutton and chicken put together. Its export is also a major business. The RSS combine on one side aims to subjugate the Minorities and on the other wants to maintain the status quo of social relationship of caste and gender. These are subtle and overt maneuvers implemented through political and cultural conduits. Attitude of communal politics to dalits has been a complex one. The anti dalit violence of 1980 against reservation, the anti OBC violence of 1986 against promotion of OBCs in jobs, and its strengthening of Kamandal politics (Rath Yatra and the Babri demolition) in response to Mandal were a part of this.

At another level the strategy is to co-opt dalits into Hindutva fold. From middle of decades of 1980s RSS has activated Samajik Samrasta Manch (Social Harmony Forum) which has been mobilizing dalits around that. The Gurus like Sri Sri Ravishanker have been saying that there should be harmony between upper and lower caste, while he keeps quiet about the prevalent social injustice in various forms. The aim of the communal politics is to maintain the status quo of caste and gender.

Through Samajik Samrasta Manch the message of undermining caste atrocities and social injustice is actively propagated. Supplementing this is the cultural assertion and imposition of elite norms on the whole society. Food habits are a part of culture and for large sections of dalits and Adiviasis beef had been an integral part of their food. Incidentally there is a vigorous campaign to promote vegetarianism and denigrate non vegetarian food practices.

While the large section of dalits is struggling for social and economic justice, a section of dalits is undergoing the process of sanskritization as well. It is in this light that the symbols of dalit assertion in the matters of food habits and cultural expressions are being attacked openly. The compromised state apparatus is not able to stand up to this onslaught of communal politics to preserve the social and democratic rights of dalits and other marginalized sections of society, be it the matters of their physical security, questions of equity and food habits. It is a blatant attempt to manipulate culture, to impose elite norms, through influencing the food habits, which are so much cultural in their nature.

It seems Mother Cow may be the major emotive weapon to be used for the politics deriving its legitimacy from Hindu religions’ identity. Interestingly it reveals the twin goals of this politics. At surface it is to reduce the minorities to a status of second class citizen and at deeper level to subjugate dalits at social, political and cultural level.

(Ram Puniyani was a Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology, Powai and works keenly on social issues. He is the author of three books including Communal Politics: An illustrated primer.)

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect BH’s editorial policy.

Kamala Kanta Dash, BeyondHeadlines

A group of parents whose children have been denied admission to pre-primary classes in a number of private schools in Delhi through a Special Leave Petition (SLP) have approached the Supreme Court to intervene to ensure fair and inclusive practices in admissions. The petition filed by Snehasshish Mukherjee has been signed by Dr. Midhat Hussain, Tarique Akhtar, Syed Md. Talha, Masood Alam and Afroz Alam Sahil and the legal support has been provided by lawyers like Advocate Sarim Naved and  Political Activist  Adv. Adil Hasan.

The petition establishes how the private schools continue irrational admission policies for pre-primary school admissions which have led to a bias against children living in certain areas of the city which happen to have a high concentration of Muslim residents.

The petition complains that despite Muslims being 12 percent of Delhi’s population, the number of Muslim children being admitted to the nursery classes in these schools as a percentage of the total number of admissions is a mere 0.5 percent. It is indeed a matter of grave concern that while roughly one out of eight persons on the streets of Delhi is a Muslim, only one out of two hundred of the children admitted to pre-primary schools is a Muslim.

The petition has not only identified this practice as unfair and worrying in the context of children’s education, but in the context of a larger worry, that is leading to increasing ghettoization of Muslims in Delhi. The petitioners have gone further and have asserted that they now strongly believe that the attempts to marginalise students from the Muslim localities and from the Muslim Community in particular are nothing but deliberate. This is a dangerous situation of deliberate exclusion and the government and the Supreme Court need to take immediate steps to intervene and set it right.

Moreover, private schools cannot shy away from their responsibilities and cannot discriminate against students on the basis of their religion.  The action of private schools in discriminating against Muslim neighbourhoods and Muslim children does violate their fundamental rights of access to education. The applicants have requested the court to ensure a situation where admissions to private schools are carried out in a fair, transparent and inclusive manner.

Note: BH has a copy of this Special Leave Petition and the author has used the petition as the base to write this article.

(The author is Honorary Editor of Beyond Headlines and is working on the Engagement of the Muslim Community in Policy making in India and Australia for his PhD at Monash University. He can be reached at kamaljnu@gmail.com)

“India is a corrupt country, but I’m not part of the corruption” — this is what each one of us believes. Even a traffic cop who takes a bribe doesn’t think that he is a corrupt man. He believes that he is only doing what is necessary to sustain his family with dignity; after all, his salary is really quite low, his working conditions are really quite bad, his level of frustration is really quite high, and the cost of living really is genuinely going up! So, when a motorist who breaks a signal by mistake offers him a hundred bucks, why shouldn’t he take it? Besides, his bosses and colleagues may treat him like a pariah if he tries to be the only pure one among them, and that is a big problem.

At the other end of the spectrum, the wealthy businessman believes that he is doing nothing by bankrolling ministers, bureaucrats, top-cops and political party bosses; having friends in the right places is necessary for removing unnecessary obstacles. Funding the decision-makers is an unavoidable cost of doing big business – a sort of indirect tax imposed on rich businessmen.

Team Anna terms the parliament and the state legislatures as the epicenter of corruption. That may well be true. But ask yourself, how else can it be? How can a career politician maintain his family if he refuses to accept the friendship of wealthy people? To even be considered for a party post – say, the general secretary of the Congress party in the state — one must spend all the productive hours of his day mobilizing hundreds of party workers for meetings, rallies etc. For this, he needs substantial daily cash-flows for chai-nashta,pamphlets, flex banners etc. The most available party workers will be those without a full-time job or a business. So, people who occupy party positions are either moneyed people or those with rich friends willing to invest in them… and quite often, a combination of both. And, as no friendship is a one way street, benefits just naturally flow towards the rich friends who provide party funds.

Team Anna, Baba Ramdev and their diehard supporters don’t appear to be applying their mind to altering these ground realities. The aam janta is happy with their oversimplification of the discussion about corruption into an us-versus-them theme – as if life is a movie with readymade heroes, villains and victims. Their theory is: the guys chanting ‘Vande Mataram’ and ‘Mera Bharat Mahaan’ and going on hunger strikes are the good guys, and the other lot – sitting in government offices all over the country — are the bad guys. The bad guys are afraid of one one thing – Jan Lokpal. So, if you arm-twist these bad guys in parliament to pass the Jan Lokpal bill, then the good guys will suddenly be in power, and all the bad guys will be running helter-skelter to save their skin, and the public can go home happy that good has once again triumphed over evil. Oh, how we love happy endings!

We need to see a more sophisticated understanding of the sordid reality around us. And for such an understanding, we need to first let go of our righteous anger and indignation, and invite the “corrupt people” to join us at the table for discussion. Only in this way can we gain the collective insight and wisdom needed for solving the problems that India faces.

WE ALL HAVE INTIMATE KNOWLEDGE OF CORRUPTION

Each of us – whether great or small — is an insider in some knowledge domains, and an outsider in most domains. Many of us are intimately aware of how and where exactly wrongdoings are carried out, and by whom. But we remain silent, and don’t speak the truth because we don’t consider it important or worthwhile to speak out. We want other people to speak first and pay the price; we ourselves wish to continue our lives in comfort. By our silence and indifference, or by our lack of initiative to blow the whistle, we become part of the great conspiracy of silence.

The theory propagated by Team Anna is that India is being stabbed in the heart by crooked parliamentarians. While this is not untrue, a larger and more widespread truth is that we are ourselves inflicting on India a death by a thousand cuts. We the People are part of a great big conspiracy of silence, and the country’s only hope lies in our breaking this conspiracy of silence by speak whatever we know. Here are some examples of our knowledge, and our participation in the conspiracy of silence:

• · SMALL-TIME LAWYERS, JUDICIAL CLERKS & HABITUAL LITIGANTS have intimate knowledge of some things about court functioning that even eminent lawyers and judges may not know – for example how the order of cause-lists are changed at the last minute, how important petitions are held up for petty clerical reasons, and how public notaries, public prosecutors, magistrates and judges of the higher judiciary make money on the side. Eminent jurists may be ignorant of such things, because they operate at a different level.

• · HAWKERS, CONSTABLES & LOITERERS who stand on the street all day have intimate knowledge of how to create a hawker territory, and how to predict the movement of anti-encroachment municipal vans. They are keenly aware of the effects of change of duty assignment in the municipal and police administration, and how new and zealous officers are routinely “settled”, and by whom. The man on the street knows things about the real India that would make Planning Commission chiefs and World Bank economists prostrate themselves in humility. They may not have the paperwork to prove what they way, but even photographs and videos taken on cellphones can often reveal so much!

• · IAS AND IPS OFFICERS – in service and retired – turned into activists, they could single-handedly change the political and business environment in our country if they revealed what goes on in the government. (If you think that civil society activists or RTI activists know much about corruption, forget it!) Corrupt people in the establishment won’t know where to hide their faces if these people went public!

• · PLANT MANAGERS, PURCHASE MANAGERS & STOREKEEPERS in both private and public sector concerns have intimate knowledge of unsafe industrial practices, adulteration, improper maintenance and substandard materials. Quite often, they may voice their concern to their superiors and peers, but that is ineffective in curbing the wrongdoings. To break the conspiracy of silence, they need to come out with the truth before the public.

• · ARCHITECTS – both well-known ones and ordinary ones –have in their minds a detailed map of how land grabs and building scams are carried out. But they are not telling, because they are the guys who make it all happen.

• · LAW FIRMS ENGAGED BY BIG BUILDERS have a thorough knowledge of the illegalities that they help to commit and cover up. They are not telling because they are making indecent amounts of money. If one or two professionals tell their story with documents, big names in the industry will run around looking for fig leaves to hide their shame.

• · CHARTERED ACCOUNTANTS are to the world of business what gynecologists are to the world of women; they have their fingers deep inside whatever is kept hidden from the world. Only CAs have any understanding of the complicated maze of ownership patterns of many groups of companies, consisting of dozens of family trusts, holding companies, individual directors etc. Through such networks, Birla and Ambani family members may hold a larger stake in some Tata companies than the Tata family itself – and vice-versa. Hidden in the maze of group companies, associate companies (subsidiaries), foreign collaborators based in tax-haven countries etc. etc., there is a whole “corporate India” whose economy is many times larger than that of the India we know. In the public mind, “corporate” means clean and law-abiding; in actual fact, corporate entities have a lot of criminality, and massive white-collar crimes are perpetrated by employees who act under improper authorization.

• · PRIESTS & TRUSTEES OF TEMPLE TRUSTS & CHARITIES, especially those controlled by politicians receive large and inexplicable donations in cash, jewelry etc round the year. In the weeks and days before the last date to file tax returns, CAs of all sizes are busy calling one another and making adjustments between businesses that have too much cash, and want to bring some of it on the records, and others who have too much income on their books, and want to make it disappear from their books by conversion into cash. Temples and charitable trusts are massive conduits of black-money, and no place – be it the Shirdi temple or the Siddhivinayak temple – is too sacred to engage in such dealings. If only the priests and trustees were to speak up with specific examples and documents!

• · FIXERS AT PMO, CMO, MANTRALAYA, MINISTERS RESIDENCES, PARTY OFFICES & other power centres do the complicated job of getting various licenses and government permissions. These people may be professional architects, lawyers, CAs, journalists, entrepreneurs, or managing committee members of well-known chambers of commerce — but this tribe of people knows how to get things done for love or for money. And it isn’t only individual fixers, but corporates – often called consultants — that make things happen. Nira Radia’s Vaishnavi Communications was accidentally outed and had to close down, but there are dozens of Vaishnavis still out there, flying below everybody’s radar. By hiring retired IAS and IPS officers and friends and relatives of MLAs, MPs and ministers, they exert a great influence on policy decisions, key appointments etc.

• · PERSONAL ASSISTANTS OF PEOPLE IN KEY GOVERNMENT POSTS are intimately aware of “indecent proposals”. For example, it is an open secret that the Registrar of Cooperatives and other officials are routinely paid Rs 25,000 per flat undergoing redevelopment, just for attending the meeting for video-taping the consent. Otherwise, that crucial meeting will get endlessly delayed, causing huge loss to the builder. If insiders in such departments blew the whistle on their bosses and colleagues, a major clean-up could happen, and misgovernance could be brought under control.

• · MEDICAL PROFESSIONALS are all bound together by a network of kickbacks. Every time your family doctor recommends tests worth Rs 1000, he earns Rs 400 to 600 by way of commission from the pathology lab. Whenever your general physician refers you to a super-specialist who charges, say, Rs 50,000, your family doctor gets Rs 2000 or more. And if he recommends hospitalization which makes you — or your medical insurance company — poorer by Rs 50,000, your friendly and ever-so-caring family doctor becomes richer by Rs 10,000 or more.

• · PANELISTS OF WELL-KNOWN HOSPITALS are given monthly growth targets to fulfill in terms of bed-occupancy; that means that your super-specialist or consulting surgeon is under performance pressure to put people under the knife, like so many sheep sent to the slaughterhouse. Many doctors admit in private conversations that many surgeries are avoidable. We are waiting for some doctors to go public about this shocking abuse of our trust with revealing internal documents and correspondence.

• · AUTHORIZED WORKSHOPS OF VARIOUS AUTOMOBILE MANUFACTURERS are under performance pressure. In order to attain quarterly growth targets, the auto companies try to accelerate the turnover of their spare parts by forcing workshops to achieve numerical quarterly targets for items such as car batteries, bearings and bushings. As a consequence, even if your batter and other parts are quite ok, the supervisor who draws up a job card and estimate tends to say things like, “Sir, your battery performance is slightly weak, and the bushings of the rear wheel suspension has become a bit hard due to age. Nothing urgent, but the vehicle performance will definitely improve if you change these whenever you are financially comfortable.” A lot of men feel that their manhood is being called into question, and respond with, “Uh, ok, change them. How much will it all cost?” In this way, the supervisor and auto mechanics makes you cough up a lot of money for change of battery and a whole suspension job. They earn “performance incentives” as a percentage of the cost of spare parts and labour charges, and they also earn promotions. Most reputed garages are part of this malpractice. Hopefully soon, some insiders will spill the beans with statistics, quarterly reports, and internal documents.

• · PR AGENCIES “manage” the news that appears in the media in very subtle ways. Paid news isn’t a single monolithic phenomenon; it is a mixture of event management and celebrity handling, clever photographs, sponsored articles, and personal friendships with sub-editors, editors and proprietors of newspapers. It’s a smooth job that goes on 24×7, and PR agencies are low-profile players who cultivate good relations with individual journalists on the one hand and corporate houses on the other hand, and act as go-betweens without proper authorizations and controls.

WE MUST FACILITATE WHISTLEBLOWERS, BECOME THEIR PROTECTIVE CLOAK

Corruption is not only in the government, it is in all spheres of life. For our battle against corruption to become widespread, we need to bring insiders from various fields of knowledge to the discussion table. To truly change India from the inside, we must engage and facilitate such people, and not alienate them with name-calling. Because, only people with privileged information can convincingly disclose how the country’s various democratic institutions are being subverted, and only they can enable us to plug the leakages in the system. Without the intelligence inputs provided by them, our anti-corruption campaigns will only be so much sloganeering, wishful thinking and shooting in the dark.

We must encourage insiders in various domains of knowledge to speak up, with the support of documents that support their story. Some may want to come out into the open with their names, but many of them will want the protective cloak of confidentiality before they reveal all… and we must provide them that level of comfort. We must be their shield and their mouthpieces.

INDIVIDUAL ACTIVISTS & JOURNALISTS CAN GIVE REALISTIC PROTECTION to a whistleblower, more than any Whistleblowers’ Act. If a few dozen of us made ourselves publicly available as contact points and facilitators for whistleblowers, across the country, our collective effect would probably surpass CVC, CBI and CAG all put together. There are already quite a few of us, and this tribe of facilitators is growing. Let there be many more; let the tribe increase!

(Krishnaraj Rao is a prominent Right-to-Information activist and journalist based in Mumbai. He can be reached at thebravepedestrian@gmail.com)

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect BH’s editorial policy. 

While turning the pages of history of the colonial Indian Muslim politics, only issue that comes immediately to our mind is their engagement with the question of Hindu-Muslim relations, communalism, and power sharing formula in various sectors/ institutions. Here is a case a little away from all such issues.

It is a relatively lesser known aspect of history that Mr. Md. Yunus earns the distinction of having served as the first Premier (Prime Minister, now called Chief Minister) of Bihar during April- July 1937.

Starting his career as barrister, he also flirted with journalism by bringing out English daily, Patna Times, an English weekly, edited by Shambhunath Jha. He was elected on the symbol of the Muslim Independent Party (MIP) in 1937, which had emerged as the second largest party in Bihar, almost routing the separatist political formations like the Syed Abdul Aziz led Muslim United Party, i.e. MUP (launched in December 1936, subsequently it merged with the Muslim League, which was organizationally almost non-existent in Bihar till the 1937 elections), and Ahrar. As many as 20 candidates were elected on the symbol of MIP, 6 more independent candidates and 3 Muslim candidates belonging to the Congress (including Dr. Syed Mahmud, 1889-1971) won with the support of the MIP.

In the 1937 provincial elections the Congress and the MIP contested elections with seat adjustments. The MIP won 15 out of 40 reserved seats and the Congress won five seats. The Muslim League was unable to secure any seats.
Such ideological affinity and electoral adjustment gave rise to an impression in the public mind that the Congress and MIP would jointly form the government in Bihar. The Congress, however, reneged on the tacit understanding, giving a rude shock to the Muslims. The Congress, on the issue of ‘Governor’s discretion’ initially refused to form the ministry. The Congress insisted that it would form the ministry only after an assurance from the Governor that he would not use his special/ discretionary powers. The deadlock in Bihar continued from April to July 1937; till then the MIP, the second largest Party, formed its ministry under Md. Yunus, making it clear that it would give way to the Congress, once it decided to accept office. The plea of the MIP was that the Act of 1935 itself provided for Governor’s special powers, and the very fact that the Congress contested elections on the basis of the Act was evidence of the Congress’ acceptance of the condition (Governor’s special powers). Some Urdu sources indicate that the MIP wished to form a coalition ministry with the Congress, which was not acceptable for the latter, even in July 1937. Accordingly, the MIP, being the second largest party, formed its ministry (for about 120 days during April-July 1937), though making it pretty clear that it would give way to a new ministry as soon as the Congress reconsidered its decision. However, there took place a sort of ‘Hindu backlash’ against the MIP, whereby, according to Taqi Raheem, even the Socialists, including Abdul Bari, were embittered by the fact of the MIP’s formation of the interim ministry. (For details see my essay in SAHC, London, vol. 2, no.1, January 2011, It details how the Congress outrageously denied legitimate share in power to the Muslims)

What was MIP? 

The Muslim Independent Party (MIP) was a political party launched on 12 September 1936 by the Imarat-e-Shariah, under the leadership of Maulana Abul Mohasin Mohd Sajjad (d. 1940) of the Jamiatul Ulema-e-Hind. This [the Imarat-e-Shariah] was an agenda of Maulana Azad, in whose, “scheme of things, in countries like India where Muslims were a minority and did not hold political power, the Imarat would function as an institution of political authority and state power…He envisaged it maintaining a relationship with the country’s government through a collective agreement” (Papiya Ghosh, IESHR, 1997). Assisted by ulema and mashaikh, in order to prepare a legitimate popular support base, the Imarat had to establish shariat courts (Darul Qaza).  The MIP was described as a party for the emancipation of the poor and the uplift of agriculture. The MIP supported the Congress goal of independence but aimed at securing constitutional safeguards for religion and culture. For bearing ‘an unmistakable resemblance with the Congress’ the MIP earned lamentations of the Bihar Muslim League (The Indian Nation, 9 November 1934). Its leaders like Usman Ghani, Hafiz Md sani and Shaikh Adalat Husain of Bettiah had suffered imprisonment for having participated in the Civil Disobedience movement of 1930-32 (The Indian Nation, 10 November 1934). Imarat-e-Shariah’s mouthpiece Imarat, an Urdu fortnightly (banned during the Civil Disobedience Movement) and subsequently giving birth to Naqeeb, Urdu weekly articulated the muttahidah qaumiyat (composite nationalism) and contested the two nation theory of Jinnah’s Muslim League till very end.

How did Yunus’ ministry perform?

Displaying his deep concern for being accommodative towards all social groups, Yunus made it a point to have people from a cross section in his cabinet.  He kept the departments of Law and Order, Judicial and Jail, Education and Registration with himself. Babu Guru Sahai Lal was given Rural Development; Kumar Ajit Prasad Singh Dev was given Local Self Government, and Abdul Wahab Khan got the Revenue dept.

Agrarian issues seem to have been addressed on priority basis by the Yunus led ministry. An Urdu account (1987) written by his contemporary, Asghar Imam Falsafi (1902-1997), in his, Mr Mohd Yunus ke Daur-e-Wizarat ka Ek Aks, records that Mr. Yunus was very accessible to the common people, undertook mammoth visits of the villages, directly hearing the problems of the peasants; he paid special attention to the production of sugar-canes and to control flood. [Taqi Raheem has also compiled Tazkira-e-Yunus.] In 1931 food grain prices had fallen. He, therefore, reduced the burden of rent to be paid by the tenants. The Hindi-Urdu tension and the Hindu-Muslim tension was a subject nobody could afford to ignore then. He was a type of politician who never tried to shift the blames. He never allowed the personal prejudices to influence his professional business. For example, his decision to accept the office of the ministry was met with great uproar by the Congress and the Socialists. On 31st March 1937, they staged a huge dharna before the house of Mr Md Yunus; which had turned violent and stone pelting was done on Yunus’ house.  Thus they were arrested by the police. On 1st April, immediately after accepting the office, the first order issued by Mr Yunus was to release them, and other under-trial prisoners/ freedom fighters unconditionally. Frequent jail inspection to look after the inmates (mostly freedom fighters), where he had hours long detailed conversations with the inmates, and it was a testimony of his style of functioning. Responding to a communal tension in Aurangabad, on 22 April 1937, he rushed to the place of occurrence, involved the two communities in talks and persuaded them to agree for peaceful living, without calling even a single extra policeman; he personally led the procession of idol immersion. This exercise consumed his four hours and things were settled effectively. Lord Zetland is said to have got highly impressed with such a prompt, effective and judicious way of dealing with such sensitive matter, and therefore he showered laurels for his administrative management. The Hindus-Muslims of Aurangabad jointly hosted a feast in which Yunus was the chief guest.

His ministry restored the Local self Government (Democratic Decentralism), convened elections for it. Then in late 1937, he undertook a survey of the Diara lands (the then Monghyr district) along with the collectors, commissioner and the Member of the Revenue Board, and asked them to prepare a master plan for the agrarian development of that region. In 1915-16, a 15 year land settlement was made which expired on 31 March 1930, and then this settlement was again extended. But the Yunus ministry substantially reduced the rent (raiyati) to be paid by the peasantry of Diara.  It included complete waiver of the arrear of the rent for 1933-34, which was Rs 5039. And for the subsequent three years the waiver was up to 50%. This was not done out of electorally dictated hasty populism, but Yunus got done a comprehensive survey by Nagendra Lal Bose, the Deputy Collector. A proper legislation was done (Act 112), applications for the reduction of lagan were invited by the Settlement officers of the thanas, on four anna stamp paper, without requiring signature of an advocate. This was done by extensive campaign in the villages so that the peasants don’t fall prey of bureaucratic corruption (bribery).

Earlier in 1908, he had participated in the Lahore session of the Congress of 1908. For many years he served as the President of the Bihar Students’ Association. In 1916, he represented in the Imperial Legislative Council and during 1921-32 he was a member of the Bihar Legislative Council.

He called a comprehensive meeting with the owners of the sugar mills of the Tirhut Division, and persuaded them to operate the mills till entire crop of sugarcane reaches the mills, for it he also got reduced the rail fares by 60% so that import of the sugarcane from the adjacent provinces could be encouraged for the mills. These steps helped in mitigating the peasants’ restlessness, and thereby rural indebtedness was sought to be fought. For further achievement on this aspect of rural indebtedness, he undertook following four steps:

(a)    Establishment of a board to arbitrate the loan related disputes,
(b)   A ceiling on the rate of interest taken by the moneylenders,
(c)    Establishment of Land Mortgage Banks,
(d)   Registration of the moneylenders and ways of monitoring them

For this, he asked Y.A. Godbole, ICS to undertake journey of some of the provinces who was supposed to propose for a Conciliation Board of Cooperatives. The moneylenders were asked to furnish a list of the borrowers.
Similarly, to control flood, he personally joined the labourers working with spades to dig soil for embankment in the Adampur village of Siwan Subdivision. It earned him great popularity, and people greeted him throughout his journey from Adampur to Chapra. Every district was provided with at least 100 boats, before the rainy season and onset of flood. He also kept soliciting suggestions from the experts on containing flood.

On 16 May 1937, he rushed to Dumraon to resolve the dispute between the industrialist Ramkrishna Dalmia and the Maharaja of Dumraon. With a peace between the two, Dalmia invested a capital of Rs 5 crores, and factories of cement, lime, and paper were opened. This effort at industrial development heralded a big opportunity of employment.

In 1929, on an experimental basis, the colonial government had permitted the use of Urdu script, along with Nagri, only in Patna Division. In June 1937, Yunus extended this to entire province. [In Manbhum (then in Bihar, now in West Bengal) district, Bengali was also allowed along with Nagri].  In fact, the Bihar branch of the Anjuman Taraqqi Urdu had convened a meeting in the Anjuman Islamia Hall of Patna on 27 May 1937 pressing for this demand, and they had convened around one thousand meetings in different parts of Bihar, including some in rural areas. The Tribune is said to have given wide coverage of this movement for Urdu, and editorialized in appreciation of this step.

The magnificent, imposing buildings of the Assembly and Council, and that of the Patna Civil Court were constructed by his ministry.

He remained lifelong President of the “Theosophical Society” and “Mel Milap Association” of Annie Besant (Mahamaya Prasad was the Secretary); had donated his one of the personal houses to it. It also launched a magazine Mel Milap, it was a bilingual journal (Urdu and Nagri), which also published poems of Yunus.

He kept reiterating that the day the congress will decide to accept the office, the MIP will step down, this decision came on 7 July 1937, but as an officiating Premier he had to continue in the office till 19 July 1937. He was particularly fond of debates in the assembly/council (in fact his own election as the Premier of Bihar was done after 4 day long debates participated and arbitrated also by Maulana Azad), had 3-4 day long debates on the Act of 1935 and then proposed amendments and moved Agriculture Income Tax Bill, and a Bill for exempting the Waqf properties from taxation. He also proposed Bills for:

(a) Protection of the personal laws of the Muslims,
(b) A draft proposal for proportionate representation of Muslims in the municipal and district boards,
(c) Protection and maintenance of the Muslim Waqf properties

Besides, after quitting the office of the Premier, he did not remain silent and inactive. He spoke in the assembly on the issues like the riots of Tilkori (Hazaribagh, 10 May 1938), Giani Nabiganj (P.S. Sikandra, Monghyr, 7 July 1938), Deawan (26 July 1938), Bhagalpur (2 August 1938).

Early Life of Yunus

Born at Penhara (P.S. Naubatpur, Subdivision Danapur, Patna), he belonged to the descendents of a Sufi, Hazrat Shah Ibrahim Malik, whose tomb is on the hills of Bihar Shareef (Nalanda). His father was Moulvi Ali Hasan, a zamindar of the village, and advocate in the Patna Court. Yunus was the younger son, [elder being Yusuf, also Bar at law], got Bar at law from England in 1906 and came back to Patna. He was very fond of games and sports. He was married to Zaibunnesa, daughter of Moulvi Abdul Jabbar, an affluent zamindar and a leading lawyer of Mirzapur (UP); this family originally belonged to Patna from where they had migrated to Mirzapur. Md Yusuf Imam, barrister and leader of Congress was brother of Zaibunnesa. Besides being a successful lawyer, Yunus was thrice elected to the Legislative Council of Bihar and he was on the Patna Municipal Board during 1917-23. He also served as Director, Bihar Bank, and Bihar & Orissa Provincial Cooperative Bank., and also of Bihar United Insurance Company. He was the Chief Whip, Bihar Legislative Council, 1921-26. Yunus had a sudden attack of coronary thrombosis, while walking in a street of London, where he died on May 13 1952, and was buried in the graveyard of Brooklyn, a suburb, 7 kms away from London.

His sons Yasin Yunus and Yaqub Yunus were also advocates, and the elder (Yasin) acted his secretary. They preserve his diary and two collections of poems, Kalam-e-Yunus, and Payam-e-Mohabbat. [Yaqub Yunus, probably an Alig, was also associated with the All India Muslim Majlis Mashaweraat of Syed Mahmud (1889-1971) in 1960s.   (Courtesy: bihardays.com)

(Mohammad Sajjad is Assistant Professor at Centre of Advanced Study in History, AMU, Aligarh)

Sachin Tendulkar not Bat RTI info on fine he paid for Bandra bungalow.Sachin Tendulkar Refuse to give any type of information under RTI Act where he had moved into the bungalow without procuring the mandatory OC. Following a controversy over the “illegal occupancy”, the Master Blaster paid a penalty to the civic authority.

Master blaster and MP-in-waiting Sachin Tendulkar has no-balled public disclosure of his Bandra bungalow details. In particular, Tendulkar does not want the fine he paid for occupying his new home without an occupation certificate to be revealed under the RTI (Right to Information) Act. ”In Sachin Tendulkar’s case, he has objected to information pertaining to his home being revealed under RTI to a third party,” the BMC said in a reply to me. I had asked the civic body for information about the fine levied on Tendulkar and the amount he paid for occupying his multi-storey bungalow on Perry Cross Road at Bandra. “Civic officials have violated the RTI Act by refusing to furnish the details bcz when any case where levies charge, that doucment automatically Become a part of Record”.Last year Tendulkar had moved into the bungalow without procuring the mandatory OC. Following a controversy over the “illegal occupancy”, the cricketer paid a penalty to the civic authority. By Misusing the The 11 (1) Rule of RTI Act “The BMC asked Tendulkar whether the information sought should be provided to the applicant. Then He  objected to furnishing of details of the fine imposed on him. Therefore, the former municipal commissioner decided against the applicant.

In this case question arises why Bmc made this RTI Third Party case bcz levied charge itself a part of official Record & Record couldn’t have Third Party claim even he or she involved. Our  NGO Athak Seva Sangh wrote to Municipal Commissioner & Complaint that Bmc officer unnecessary divert Rti plea. We also demand that if Tendulkar can get OC after pay levies then throughout Mumbai apply Tendulkar Pattern to Sanction OC to Societies & Buildings who r unable to get OC same like Tendulkar. We waiting for justice & excepted Quick move by Municipal Commissioner.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect BH’s editorial policy.

The Gulbarg Society massacre case has taken an ironical turn as the Supreme Court appointed SIT has concluded in its closure report that firing by Congress leader Ehsan Jafri provoked the violent mob to set the society on fire.

The SIT report says that it was Mr. Ehsan Jafri who fired at the violent mob first, which had assembled there to take revenge of Godhra incidents from Muslims, which provoked the rioters to set the society on fire that led to the killing of Jafri and 69 others.

Giving a clean chit to Modi, the SIT in its report has proudly endorsed his ‘action and reaction’ theory by calling the massacre a reaction to Jafri’s firing.

“In his interview the CM has clearly referred to Jafris firing as ‘action’ and the massacre as ‘reaction’. It may be clarified here that in case late Ehsaan Jafri fired at the mob, this could be an immediate provocation to the mob, which had assembled there to take revenge of Godhra incidents from Muslims,” the report says.

SIT report states that no criminal case is made against Modi as he took all the necessary steps to control the situation and to contain the communal violence.

The SIT headed by RK Raghavan said that even if Modi had asked police to let the Hindus take the revenge of Godhra train burning incident, the mere statement of those in the confines of a room does not constitute an offence.

“Interpretations made on alleged illegal instructions given by the Chief Minister by RB Shreekumar and Sanjiv Bhatt, appear to be without any basis. Further, even if such allegations are believed for the sake of argument, mere statement of alleged words in the four walls of a room does not constitute any offence,” says the report by the SIT.

The SIT has also questioned the intentions of Zakia Jafri for filing the case against Modi and others four years after the incident.

It says Zakia was first questioned by the police on March 6, 2002 but she did not came up with the allegations Modi and others then.

“She appeared before the Nanavati Commission, probing the riots, on August 29, 2003 but did not disclose the facts given in this said complaint. In September 2003, she filed an affidavit in the apex court but did not level allegations against Modi and others,” the report stated.

The report further stated that the allegations in her complaint are vague, general and stereotyped.

The SIT has also dismissed all the allegations levelled against Modi by amicus curie Raju Ramchandran, who had opined that Modi can be prosecuted for “promoting enmity among different groups.” (Courtesy:Pratirodh)

In the first major operation against suspected Maoists in Assam, a joint team of the CRPF, Assam police and the Indian Army gunned down 4 men in a remote village in Tinsukia district. One police constable was also injured.

Denouncing these killings as ‘fake encounters’, Maoist ‘sympathizer’ and the President of Revolutionary Democracy Front, Varavara Rao has demanded an independent inquiry by the Assam government. According to the Union Home Secretary RK Singh, “the Maoists are trying to set up bases in Assam. This encounter would certainly halt their operations and hamper their activities in a big way”.

The RDF statement explains the spread of Maoist movement into Assam, “as a response to the continued exploitation and oppression of the people by the Indian ruling classes in collusion with the regional ruling elite of Assam, whether they belong to the Congress, BJP or AGP”.

The statement issued is as following-

Press Statement

Condemn the fake encounter of four alleged Maoist cadres in Assam by the Indian Army, CRPF and the Police!

Demand an impartial enquiry into the incident and punishment for the personnel guilty of perpetrating this cold-blooded murder!

RDF strongly condemns the cold-blooded murder of four alleged Maoist activists in Sadiya of Tinsukia district, Assam. The Assam government has claimed that a joint team of Assam Police, CRPF and Indian Army has killed four armed cadres of the Upper Assam Leading Committee of CPI (Maoist) in a ‘fierce gun-battle’ at around 10.30 a.m. on 9 May at Borgora-Deopani Nepali Gaon under the Saidya police station.

The family members of the deceased and the residents of the area have rubbished this claim by the government and the circumstances in which the four youths – Siddhartha Buragohain (Telikola village, Sadiya), Medang Gogoi alias Rajib Gogoi (Topsinga village), Hiren Chetia alias Rajat (Tokajan village) and Kamala Buragohain (No.2 Tokajan village) – all between 25 to 30 years, were killed. As per the news reports in the local media which referred to the testimonies of the villagers, this was nothing but a cold-blooded murder which was later staged as an ‘encounter’. According to the residents of the village published by the media, a commando unit of Sadiya Police arrived early in the morning and forced the villagers to move away from the house of one Bal Bahadur Limbu where they suspected that Maoist cadres were taking shelter. Thereafter the house was encircled from all directions. Two of the cadres who were on sentry duty outside the house ran to safety by firing at one of the police teams, while another police team entered the house from the rear. The police found the four youth taking food and asked them to raise their hands. There was no resistance from the unarmed youth. Subsequently all four were shot by the police from point-blank range and killed in cold blood. Later the police resorted to heavy firing on the house to manufacture evidence of a ‘heavy gun fight’ as a result of which the house was severely damaged.

The Assamese newspaper Asomiya Pratidin reports that this fake encounter has generated discontent among the people of Saidya region. They have criticised the role of the armed forces by saying that they could have arrested the four youth as per the law of the land instead of murdering them in a staged extra-judicial killing. The fake ‘encounter’ of the four alleged Maoists is the latest in the series of thousands of such extra-judicial killings by the Indian Army, CRPF and the Assam Police in the name of ‘counter-insurgency’ operations against United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) and other proscribed organisations in the last two decades of Indian Army deployment in Assam. Only four months back on 26 December 2011, three youths – Siva Moran, Dhiraj Duara and Janak Moran of Makum, Tinsukia district – were picked up and killed in a fake encounter in the Assam-Arunachal Pradesh border by the Army and the police, and were termed as ‘hardcore ULFA’ cadres who were killed in ‘retaliatory fire’! Even though the family members of the deceased have filed FIRs against the Indian Army and large demonstrations have taken place, no enquiry has been ordered into the incident by the state government, which is desperate to shielding the culprits rather than bringing the truth to the open.

The horrors of state repression during Operation Bajrang and Operation Rhino conducted by the Indian Army in the 1990s against ULFA are still fresh in the memory of the people of Assam, and so are the hundreds of so-called ‘secret killings’ orchestrated by LK Advani, Prafulla Kumar Mahanta and co. during the AGP government in the same decade. The latest fake encounter in Saidya once again displays the reality of Indian occupation of Assam, its colonial militaristic approach towards the people of Assam and crushing of their genuine struggles including the struggle for national liberation. Here any political dissent and peoples’ rebellion is dealt with the coercive might of the Indian state, and in doing so the latest method adopted by the state’s armed forces to brand activists and peoples’ movements as having affiliation or links with the Maoist movement.

The state has already branded peoples’ organisations like – Assam Students’ and Youth Organisation (ASYO), Asom Chah Jonogosthi Surakhya Samiti (Assam Tea Community Protection Committee), Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti (KMSS) etc. as Maoist fronts, and are persecuting them. More than 60 activists and individuals have been arrested in Assam over the last one year from its different parts by falsely implicating them for being Maoists. Thus, in this way, the ‘hallowed’ promises of the Indian constitution – be it the right to life, liberty or justice – are conveniently trampled under the jackboots of the army in the name of protecting ‘national security’ and ‘integrity’. The expansion of the Maoist movement into Assam is a response to the continued exploitation and oppression of the people by the Indian ruling classes in collusion with the regional ruling elite of Assam, whether they belong to the Congress, BJP or AGP.

Only a strong mobilisation of public opinion and peoples’ protest in Assam and outside can prevent these cold-blooded murders from recurring. Given the highly suspicious circumstances of the Sadiya ‘encounter’ and the testimonies of the local residents challenging the police version, RDF demands that the Assam government institute an immediate independent enquiry and file FIRs against the concerned army/police personnel involved in the killings. RDF also calls upon all the progressive and democratic organisations and individuals to protest against this fake encounter, and strengthen the fight for bringing the culprits to justice.

President

Varavara Rao

09676541715

General Secretary

Rajkishore

09717583539

Guwahati, The police in Assam have filed a charge-sheet in the court against a doctor for raping his patient. The charge-sheet under section 376 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 has been filed by the officer-in-charge of the Dholai police station (PS) on 13 March 2012 at the Court of the Chief Judicial Magistrate in the district of Cachar after investigation of a case filed by a minor girl on 27 November, 2011. This is disclosed recently by the district superintendent of police (SP) in Cachar in a report (vide No. G/SR/1281 dated 16/03/12) submitted to the Deputy Registrar of the Assam Human Rights Commission (AHRC) in response to a notice of the AHRC.

The report states that the survivor lodged a First Information Report (FIR) at Dholai PSinter alia alleging that on 27 November, 2011 at about 4 PM the complainant being accompanied by her sister in law (name withheld to protect identity) had been to the chamber of Dr. Dilip Paul at Sadagram (Dholai Bazar) where he refused to check her up. Instead, he asked her to be in his residential chamber for her check up and treatment. On her arrival at his residential chamber the accused doctor asked her to go inside while her sister in law was asked to wait outside. As soon as she entered the house, the accused doctor closed the door and window from the outside and forcibly raped her.

The AHRC issued a notice to the SP for a detailed report about the case after it registered a case of human rights violations (vide AHRC Case No. 302/2/11-12.) on the complaint filed by the Barak Human Rights Protection Committee (BHRPC).

The report of the SP, however, mentions that the medical test conducted after the investigation of the case started do not corroborate the allegations of the victim as well as those of the BHRPC against the doctor. It says that (1) evidence of recent sexual intercourse not detected, (II) evidence of violent mark not detected in her private parts and (III) her age is above 18 years and below 20 years.

The BHRC claimed that the victim/survivor is a minor girl studying in class IX.

However, on the examination of the witnesses of the complainant, witnesses of the accused and the place of occurrence the investigating police officer found that charge under section 376 of the IPC which provides punishment for rape is established, states the SP.

When the AHRC asked the BHRPC for its comments on the report of the SP the latter submitted a detailed response pointing out why the medical report can not be relied upon. According to the BHRPC the medical report can not be relied upon because (i) there was inordinate delay in conducting the test; (ii) the report goes against the circumstantial evidences; (iii) the report goes against the accounts of the witnesses as recorded by the police; and (iv) the element of sympathy of the doctors who conducted the test towards the doctor who is the alleged violator creeping in and vitiating the objectivity of the findings can not be ruled out as both of them are colleagues and belong to the same profession.

The BHRPC also said that the filing of charge-sheet by the police will facilitate the criminal court to conduct trial on the criminal aspect of case in order only to fix criminal liability and proportionate penal measure called for under the law. It is not the domain of the trial court to consider human rights liability of the violator and remedies to the victim/survivor. Therefore, it comes under the jurisdiction of the Commission to fix human rights liability and more importantly to provide redress to the victim/survivor in terms of adequate compensation.

The BHRPC in its submission urged the AHRC to recommend to the authorities to provide an adequate amount of compensation to the victim/survivor; and while fixing the quantum of the compensation the AHRC should take into consideration the aggravating factors involved in the case such as (a) that the alleged violator is a government servant paid from the state exchequer for acting as savoir for those who are in physical distress; (b) that the victim/survivor went to the alleged violator in full trust as his position demands; (c) that the alleged violator took benefit of position of custodian of the victim/survivors at the moment of commission of the violating acts; (d) that the case has a clear custodial angle; (e) that the age and social and other circumstances of the victim/survivor are such that the minor girl has had an entire life full of colours but which has been destroyed beyond repair for no faults of hers and her life has become an undesirable and unbearable burden on her fragile shoulders.