Condemn BJP's Attack on the Right to Protest! Drop the False Charges Against Dipankar Bhattacharya!

Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam
Rashtrapati Bhavan
New Delhi
India

cc Sri Arjun Munda
Chief Minister, Jharkhand

We, the undersigned individuals and organisations, condemn in the strongest possible terms the false charges, including attempted murder which have been framed against CPI (ML) General Secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya and others in a fast-track court in Ranchi under Sections 147, 114, 148, 149, 353, 323, 324, 307, 188, 431 of the IPC and Section 17 of the CLA (a repealed act that continues to be invoked in Jharkhand !).

On March 1, 2001 the CPI(ML) had organized a protest march led by Dipankar Bhattacharya to the newly formed Jharkhand Assembly. The protestors were demanding action against police officials who had killed eight Adivasi demonstrators opposing the NDA governments move to resume the controversial Koel Karo project which threatens to displace thousands of Adivasi households. The march was also protesting against a number of other incidents of unprovoked police firing.

The police reaction to the March 1 demonstration was brutal: newspapers carried photographs of dozens of CPI(ML) activists lying bloody and battered, and of the police dragging away Dipankar Bhattacharya and the late Mahendra Singh (then CPI(ML)s MLA in the Jharkhand Assembly) by their clothes and hair. For exercising their democratic rights, not only were Dipankar Bhattacharya and other activists assaulted and arrested, they were subsequently framed under fabricated charges.

As a number of eminent civil libertarians have noted, BJP-ruled Jharkhand has become notorious for blatant violations of human rights. Apart from a spate of horrific police atrocities, Jharkhand has also witnessed disturbing cases of state-sponsored murder including those of Prashant Sahay, a spirited public interest lawyer, and MLA Mahendra Singh, the popular CPI(ML) leader and legislator. The CBI team probing Mahendra Singhs assassination has found the police guilty of violating all standard norms after the murder even as Dipak Varma, the erstwhile Superintendent of Police in Giridih and one of the prime accused in the murder case, continues to be shielded by the Jharkhand government.

We also wish to express our outrage at the double standards of the BJP-led government of Jharkhand. While all the cases pertaining to their supporters and allies, such as those arising from the Ram Janambhoomi campaign and the Jharkhand movement, have been withdrawn, the case against CPI(ML) leaders and activists is being zealously pursued.

For the General Secretary of a recognised political party leading a political protest to voice certain issues before a representative Assembly to be charged with attempted murder sets a sinister precedent and represents an assault on the very right to protest.

We urge you to take urgent action to ensure that the thoroughly fabricated and politically motivated charges levelled against Dipankar Bhattacharya and four others arrested with him are immediately and unconditionally withdrawn.