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Move to decriminalise suicide raises hope for Irom Sharmila's release

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Irom-Sharmila

Imphal: The central government’s move to decriminalise attempt to suicide has ushered in new hope for release of Manipur’s rights activist Irom Sharmila Chanu, who has been fasting for over 14 years.

The human rights fraternity of the northeastern state is now planning to move the court for release of Sharmila, better known as the “Iron Lady of Manipur”, who has been fasting since November 2000 to demand repeal of the Armed Forces Special Powers’ Act (AFSPA).

Sharmila’s brother Irom Shinghajit expressed his happiness over the decision, saying this would help Sharmila get out of the jail and will boost their movement against the AFSPA.

Manipur-based rights activist Babloo Loitongbam said: “We are going to move court soon for necessary orders. The central government’s decision has removed criminal tinge from the Sharmila’s movement, we have been saying that her movement is a political one.”

Sharmila decided to sit for indefinite fast after the Assam Rifles killed 10 civilians at Malom in Imphal.

A court in August observed that the “charge of attempt to commit suicide was wrongly framed against the petitioner (Sharmila)” and asked the state government to release her immediately.

However, she was re-arrested within 48 hours of her release. Justifying her re-arrest, Manipur Police said Sharmila was re-arrested on charges of attempt to commit suicide under Section 309 of the IPC.

Union Minister of State for Home Haribhai Parathibhai Chaudhary Wednesday told the Rajya Sabha that the government has decided to decriminalise “attempt to suicide” by deleting section 309 of the Indian Penal Code from the statute book.

The AFSPA, which covers large parts of northeastern India and Kashmir, gives security forces sweeping powers to search, enter property and shoot-on-sight and is seen by critics as cover for human rights abuses.

(IANS)

Beatings, waterboarding, insects: CIA's cruel interrogation methods

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(Image: Witness Against Torture/flickr)

(Image: Witness Against Torture/flickr)

Washington: Sleep deprivation for over a week, beatings, shackling, and waterboarding – a grim litany of the cruel methods used by the Bush-era CIA to interrogate al Qaeda terror suspects was exposed in a report on Tuesday.

The shocking report released by the US Senate found that the techniques employed by the Central Intelligence Agency were “far more brutal” than the spy agency had previously admitted to.

Al Qaeda and Taliban detainees in orange jumpsuits sit in a holding area under the surveillence of US military police at Camp X-Ray at Naval Base Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. (AFP Photo)

It was drawn up over several years by the Senate intelligence committee, which revealed such techniques were applied with “significant repetition for days or weeks at a time” on prisoners rounded up in the “war on terror” launched after the 2001 terror attacks on the United States.

The worst treatment was meted out at a secret CIA detention site dubbed COBALT where “unauthorized” interrogation techniques were used in 2002.

Slaps and ‘wallings’

Beginning with the CIA’s first high-value al Qaeda detainee Abu Zubaydah, suspects were routinely slammed against a wall by their interrogators and hit with rolled-up towels.

Facial slaps, or “insults,” as well as stomach punches were also used.

The interrogators also used “attention grasps” in which the prisoner is grabbed with both hands, one on each side of the collar and pulled towards the interrogator.

Sleep deprivation

This involved keeping detainees awake for up to 180 hours, or more than a week, usually standing or in stress positions, sometimes with their hands shackled above their heads, chained to the ceiling.

Abu Zubaydah was kept in an all-white room that was lit 24 hours a day. Or he was kept awake by non-stop questioning.

At least five detainees suffered “disturbing hallucinations” but in at least two cases the CIA continued with the interrogation method.

Confinement and isolation

Over 20 days, Abu Zubaydah spent 266 hours (11 days, 2 hours) in a large coffin-size box, and 29 hours in an even smaller one during his interrogation at what was dubbed Detention Site Green.

In the COBALT facility, dubbed a “dungeon” by the chief of interrogations, prisoners were kept in complete darkness, often shackled with their hands above their heads and mainly nude.

They were bombarded with loud music and noise and given a bucket as a toilet. In 2002 a prisoner who had been partially nude and chained to a concrete floor died of suspected hypothermia.

Ice water baths or showers were also used to try to break suspects.

Some detainees were also forced to wear diapers, although guidelines said they could not be left on longer than 72 hours.

‘Rough takedowns’

This was used at the COBALT facility. About five CIA agents would scream at a detainee, drag him outside his cell, cut his clothes off and wrap him in duct tape.

He would then be hooded and dragged up and down a dirt hallway while being slapped and punched.

After his death at the COBALT site, Gul Rahman was found to have been covered with bruises and abrasions on his shoulders, pelvis, arms, legs and face.

Nudity

Prisoners were often stripped and left nude in their cells. Zubaydah was kept naked but given a towel to cover himself during interrogations. Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, the alleged mastermind of the 2000 attack on the USS Cole, was often naked during his grillings. But at one point he was given clothes when he was wracked by shivering due to a head-cold.

Psychological threats

CIA officers regularly threatened the detainees. One was told he would only leave the facility in “a coffin-shaped box.”

At least three detainees were told the CIA would hurt their families, including their children.
There was a threat to sexually abuse the mother of one, while another was told his mother’s throat would be cut. The methods were supposed to ensure prisoners developed a sense of “Learned helplessness.”

Nashiri was blindfolded and a pistol was placed near his head, while a CIA officer also operated a cordless drill near his body in a macabre game of Russian roulette.

Forced rectal feeding

At least five prisoners were subjected to “rectal rehydration or rectal feeding without documented medical necessity,” the report said.

Other detainees were given a liquid diet of protein drinks known as Ensure “as a means of limiting vomiting during waterboarding.”

Waterboarding

In this technique of previously described “near drownings,” the detainee was bound to an inclined bench with his feet usually raised.

A cloth is placed over the forehead and eyes and water is then poured in a controlled way onto the clothing. The cloth is then lowered over the nose and mouth.

Once the cloth is saturated, the prisoner’s flow of air is restricted for up to 40 seconds while the cloth is left in place over the nose and mouth.

The self-confessed mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, is known to have been waterboarded 183 times.

In March 2003 he was subjected to five waterboard sessions over 25 hours.

“The waterboarding technique was physically harmful, inducing convulsions and vomiting,” the report said.

Insects

In July 2002, the attorney general verbally approved putting Zubaydah in a box with an non-stinging insect because he is afraid of them. It was not clear from Tuesday’s summary though if this technique was actually used.

Spy agency faces backlash

US President Barack Obama declared some of the past practices to be “brutal, and as I’ve said before, constituted torture in my mind. And that’s not who we are,” he told the Spanish-language TV network Telemundo in an interview.

Obama said releasing the report was important “so that we can account for it, so that people understand precisely why I banned these practices as one of the first acts I took when I came into office, and hopefully make sure that we don’t make those mistakes again.”

Republican Senator John McCain, tortured in Vietnam as a prisoner of war, was out of step with some fellow Republicans in welcoming the report and endorsing its findings.

“We gave up much in the expectation that torture would make us safer,” he said in a Senate speech. “Too much.”

Five hundred pages were released, representing the executive summary and conclusions of a still-classified 6,700-page full investigation.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the Democratic committee chairman whose staff prepared the summary, branded the findings a stain on US history.

“Under any common meaning of the term, CIA detainees were tortured,” she declared, commanding the Senate floor for an extended accounting of the techniques identified in the investigation.

In a statement, CIA Director John Brennan said the agency made mistakes and has learned from them.

But he also asserted the coercive techniques “did produce intelligence that helped thwart attack plans, capture terrorists and save lives.”

In Geneva, the United Nations’ special rapporteur on human rights and counter-terrorism, Ben Emmerson, said, the report confirms “that there was a clear policy orchestrated at a high level within the Bush administration, which allowed to commit systematic crimes and gross violations of international human rights law.”

He said international law prohibits the granting of immunity to public officials who have engaged in acts of torture, including both the actual perpetrators and senior government officials who authorized the policies. “The individuals responsible for the criminal conspiracy revealed in today’s report must be brought to justice, and face criminal penalties commensurate with the gravity of their crimes.”

The report, released after months of negotiations with the administration about what should be censored, was issued as US embassies and military sites worldwide strengthened security in case of an anti-American backlash.

The US embassies in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Thailand warned of the potential for anti-American protests and violence after the release of the Senate report. The embassies also advised Americans in the three countries to take appropriate safety precautions, including avoiding demonstrations.

(AFP)

Women with disabilities locked away and abused

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End Forced Institutionalization, Sexual and Physical Violence, Involuntary Treatment

A resident sits on the floor in the women’s ward of Thane Mental Hospital, a 1,857-bed facility in the suburbs of Mumbai. © 2013 Shantha Rau Barriga/Human Rights Watch

A resident sits on the floor in the women’s ward of Thane Mental Hospital, a 1,857-bed facility in the suburbs of Mumbai.
© 2013 Shantha Rau Barriga/Human Rights Watch

by HRW

New Delhi: Women and girls with disabilities in India are forced into mental hospitals and institutions, where they face unsanitary conditions, risk physical and sexual violence, and experience involuntary treatment, including electroshock therapy. As one woman put it, they are “treated worse than animals.”

In a new report released today, Human Rights Watch found that women forcibly admitted to government institutions and mental hospitals suffer grave abuses and called for the government to take prompt steps to shift from forced institutional care to voluntary community-based services and support for people with disabilities.

“Women and girls with disabilities are dumped in institutions by their family members or police in part because the government is failing to provide appropriate support and servaices,” said Kriti Sharma, researcher at Human Rights Watch. “And once they’re locked up, their lives are often rife with isolation, fear, and abuse, with no hope of escape.”

The Indian government should immediately order inspections and regular monitoring of all residential facilities – private and government-run – for women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities, Human Rights Watch said. India should also take steps to ensure people with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities can make decisions about their lives and receive treatment on the basis of informed consent.

The 106-page report, “‘Treated Worse than Animals’: Abuses against Women and Girls with Psychosocial or Intellectual Disabilities in Institutions in India,” documents involuntary admission and arbitrary detention in mental hospitals and residential care institutions across India, where women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities experience overcrowding and lack of hygiene, inadequate access to general healthcare, forced treatment – including electroconvulsive therapy – as well as physical, verbal, and sexual violence. In one case, a woman with both intellectual and psychosocial disabilities was sexually assaulted by a male staff member in a mental hospital in Kolkata. The report also examines the multiple barriers that prevent women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities from reporting abuses and accessing justice.

The Indian government should pursue urgent legal reforms, including amending two bills currently before parliament, to address these abuses and protect the rights of women and girls with intellectual or psychosocial disabilities, Human Rights Watch said.

The report analyzes the situation of women and girls with disabilities in six cities across India. Research was conducted from December 2012 through November 2014 in New Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, Pune, Bengaluru, and Mysore, and is based on more than 200 interviews with women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities, their families, caretakers, mental health professionals, service providers, government officials, and the police.  Human Rights Watch visited 24 mental hospitals or general hospitals with psychiatric beds, rehabilitation centers, and residential care facilities.

There are no clear official government records or estimates of the prevalence of psychosocial or intellectual disabilities in India. The 2011 census estimates that only 2.21 percent of the Indian population has a disability – including 1.5 million people (0.1 percent of the population) with intellectual disabilities and a mere 722,826 people (0.05 percent of the population) with psychosocial disabilities (such as schizophrenia or bipolar condition). These figures are strikingly lower than international estimates by the United Nations and World Health Organization which estimate that 15 percent of the world’s population lives with a disability. The Indian Ministry of Health and Family Welfare claims much higher percentage of the Indian population is affected by psychosocial disabilities with 6-7 percent (74.2 – 86.5 million) affected by “mental disorders” and 1-2 percent (12.4 – 24.7 million) by “serious mental disorders.”

India’s government launched the National Mental Health Programme in 1982 to provide community-based services, but its reach is limited and implementation is seriously flawed in the absence of monitoring mechanisms. The District Mental Health Programme is only present in 123 of India’s 650 districts and faces a number of limitations including lack of accessibility and manpower, integration with primary healthcare services, and lack of standardized training.

In a country where gender-based discrimination is pervasive, women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities in particular face multiple layers of discrimination – on account of  their disability and gender – and are thus among the most marginalized and vulnerable to abuse and violence. Often shunned by families unable to take care of them, many end up forcibly institutionalized. The process for institutionalizing women and men in India is the same. But women and girls with disabilities face unique challenges – including sexual violence and denial of access to reproductive health – that men do not.

“Without appropriate community support and a lack of awareness, people with psychosocial disabilities are ridiculed, feared, and stigmatized in India,” Sharma said.

Families, legal guardians, and child welfare committees can admit women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities to institutions without their consent. If found wandering in the streets, they may also be picked up by the police and admitted to these institutions through court orders. If no family member comes to take them home, they can often stay there for decades. None of the women and girls interviewed by Human Rights Watch currently or formerly living in institutions were admitted with their consent. Among the 128 cases of institutional abuse that Human Rights Watch documented, none of the women or girls had successfully been able to access redress mechanisms for being institutionalized against their will or facing abuse within the institution. Most of the women and girls interviewed were not even aware of mechanisms for redress.

“Long-term warehousing of women and girls with disabilities is simply not the answer,” Sharma said. “Even in the most serious cases, there are ways to find out what kind of services they want.”

In some of the facilities visited by Human Rights Watch, overcrowding and lack of hygiene were a serious concern. For instance, as of November 2014, close to 900 people live in Asha Kiran, a government institution for people with intellectual disabilities in Delhi – nearly three times the hospital’s capacity. In Pune Mental Hospital, the superintendent, Dr. Vilas Bhailume, told Human Rights Watch: “We only have 100 toilets for more than 1,850 patients – out of which only 25 are functional; the others keep getting blocked. Open defecation is the norm.”

Human Rights Watch documented cases of 20 women and 11 girls who are currently or were recently given electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) without their consent in 4 mental hospitals. Vidya [not her real name], a 45-year-old woman with a psychosocial disability, was institutionalized by her husband and underwent ECT for months. “ECT was like a death tunnel,” she told Human Rights Watch. “I would get a headache for days…. When my medication was reduced, I started asking questions. Til then I was like a vegetable. It was only many months later that I found out that I was being given ECT.”

India ratified the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) in 2007. Under the treaty, governments must respect and protect the right to legal capacity of people with disabilities and their right to live in the community on an equal basis as others. Forced institutionalization is prohibited. However, India’s laws allow courts to appoint guardians to take decisions on behalf of people with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities, without the their free and informed consent, and India perpetuates a healthcare system where people with such disabilities are segregated in institutions instead of having access to support and services in the community.

In an attempt to bring its national legislation in line with the CRPD, in 2013, the government has introduced two bills in parliament, the Mental Health Bill and the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Bill. However, they do not fully guarantee women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities the right to legal capacity and the right to independent living, as required by the treaty.

The central government in India should immediately order an evaluation and take steps to end abusive practices and inhumane conditions in mental hospitals and state and NGO-run residential care institutions by organizing effective monitoring of such facilities, Human Rights Watch said. India should further undertake without delay a comprehensive legal reform to abolish guardianship and recognize the legal capacity of all persons with disabilities on an equal basis with others, while developing a comprehensive, time-bound plan to develop alternatives to long-term residential-based care. The few local community support and independent living initiatives available in India are run by NGOs, such as Anjali: Mental Health Rights Organization (Kolkata), The Banyan (Chennai), Bapu Trust for Research on Mind and Discourse (Pune) and Iswar Sankalpa (Kolkata).

“India has an opportunity to move away from a system of isolation and abuse and instead build a system of support and independence,” Sharma said. “The lives of millions of women with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities are at stake.”

Bhopal: A Metaphor

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'The 30th anniversary of Bhopal gas tragedy,' writes Shiva, 'should catalyse actions worldwide for justice for Bhopal and for all victims of an economy based on toxics.' (Photo: Bhopal Medical Appeal/flickr/cc)

‘The 30th anniversary of Bhopal gas tragedy,’ writes Shiva, ‘should catalyse actions worldwide for justice for Bhopal and for all victims of an economy based on toxics.’ (Photo: Bhopal Medical Appeal/flickr/cc)

by Vandana Shiva, The Asian Age

December 3, 2014, marks the 30th anniversary of the terrible Bhopal gas tragedy, which killed more than 3,000 people almost immediately, another 8,000 in the following days, and more than 20,000 in the last three decades.

Despite the tragedy of humongous proportions, the people of Bhopal are still fighting for justice despite the apathy they continue to face.

Bhopal was a watershed moment. The tragedy woke up the world to industrial, chemical violence. The chemicals being manufactured at the Bhopal plant had their roots in warfare.

Bhopal gas tragedy was a political, economic, legal watershed for India and the planet. It was a toxic tragedy at two levels the leakage of a toxic gas from a plant producing toxic pesticides, the continued presence of 350 metric tonnes of hazardous toxic waste from the now-defunct Union Carbide India Ltd’s plant in Bhopal, combined with a toxic influence of corporations on courts and successive governments. Legally, Union Carbide and the US courts escaped liability and responsibility for the damage, setting a precedent of governments shrugging their duty to protect their citizens, taking away citizens’ rights and sovereignty in order to make settlements with corporations, letting them off lightly.

The cases brought by the victims to US courts were dismissed on the grounds that the appropriate platform was the Indian legal system, though other cases involving US corporations and foreign victims were being heard in US courts. In 1999, when the victims again approached the US federal court seeking compensation for the 1984 incident as well as for the alleged ongoing environmental contamination at and around the Bhopal plant site, the case was dismissed again.

In 1989, the Indian Supreme Court approved a settlement of the civil claims against Union Carbide for $470 million. The state forcefully took over the representation of the victims on the principle of parens patriae (Latin for “parents of the nation”) — “a doctrine that grants the inherent power and authority of the state to protect persons who are legally unable to act on their own behalf”.

A criminal lawsuit against Union Carbide and Warren Anderson, its former CEO, continues since 1989. In June 2010, a court in India handed down a verdict in the case. It found Union Carbide India Ltd. and seven executives of the company guilty of criminal negligence (this came after the September 1996 order that had reduced their charges). The company was required to pay a fine of Rs 500,000 ($10,870) and the individuals were each sentenced to two years in prison and fined Rs 100,000. On August 2, 2010, the Central Bureau of Investigation filed a petition with the Supreme Court seeking to reinstate the charges of culpable homicide against the accused. In May 2011, the Supreme Court rejected this petition and declined to re-open the case to reinstate harsher charges. However, after the protests of the Bhopal survivors in November 2014, the government promised to strengthen the “curative petition” that Dow Chemical was already facing in the Supreme Court. The petition is designed to address inadequacies in the 1989 settlement on the basis that the correct figures for dead and injured were not used. The Indian government is seeking an additional amount of up to $1.24 billion, but Bhopal survivor groups, quoting the Government of India’s published figures (Indian Council of Medical Research, epidemiological report, 2004), say the required settlement amounts to $8.1 billion.

On February 6, 2001, Union Carbide Corporation became a wholly owned subsidiary of the Dow Chemical Company following an $11.6 billion transaction approved by the boards of directors of Union Carbide and the Dow Chemical Company. Owning means owning both, assets and liabilities. However, Dow would like to disown the Bhopal gas disaster. While Dow wants immunity from liability in the case of deaths and diseases caused by Union Carbide in Bhopal, it has accepted liability for harm caused to workers of Union Carbide in the US.

In January 2002, Dow settled a case brought against its subsidiary UCC by workers exposed to asbestos in the workplace and set aside $2.2 billion to address future liabilities.

The case was filed before the acquisition of Union Carbide by Dow. Dow refuses to address the death and damage caused by Union Carbide in India.

This pattern of double standards, of privatising profits and socialising disaster runs through the pattern of corporate rule being institutionalised since the Bhopal tragedy. Dow, along with Monsanto, is involved in pushing hazardous, untested GMOs on society, along with the same war-based chemicals such GMOs rely on.

On October 15, 2014, the Environmental Protection Agency, in spite of protests from citizens and scientists, gave final approval to Dow’s Enlist Duo genetically engineered corn and soya resistant to round-up and 2,4-D, or 2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid, which was one of the ingredients in Agent Orange, the Vietnam War defoliant that was blamed for numerous health problems suffered during and after the war.

As this chemical arms race unfolds, more and more communities and countries are making the democratic choice to become GMO free. In the mid-term elections of November 2014, Maui County of Hawaii voted to become GMO free. Dow and Monsanto immediately sued Maui to stop the law banning GMO cultivation.

The 30th anniversary of Bhopal gas tragedy should catalyse actions worldwide for justice for Bhopal and for all victims of an economy based on toxics. It should strengthen our resolve to create toxic-free food and agriculture systems, and to defend our freedom to be free of poisons.

Dr. Vandana Shiva is a philosopher, environmental activist and eco feminist. She is the founder/director of Navdanya Research Foundation for Science, Technology, and Ecology. She is author of numerous books including, Soil Not Oil: Environmental Justice in an Age of Climate Crisis; Stolen Harvest: The Hijacking of the Global Food Supply; Earth Democracy: Justice, Sustainability, and Peace; and Staying Alive: Women, Ecology, and Development. Shiva has also served as an adviser to governments in India and abroad as well as NGOs, including the International Forum on Globalization, the Women’s Environment and Development Organization and the Third World Network. She has received numerous awards, including 1993 Right Livelihood Award (Alternative Nobel Prize) and the 2010 Sydney Peace Prize.

Camp of Wrongs: A fact finding report on sterilisation deaths in Bilaspur

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STERILIZATION-India

A report by Sama Resource Group for Women and Health, Jan Swasthya Abhiyan and National Alliance for Maternal Health and Human Rights

The tragic deaths of the 13 women, all in their 20s or 30s and the critical condition of the 70 other women, following procedures of laparoscopic sterilisation in Bilaspur district, Chhattisgarh, raise grave questions once again about the callous treatment of women, the poor and marginalised as well as the clear violations of ethical and quality norms in the health care system. This unacceptable incident calls urgent attention to the unsafe, unhygienic conditions and the slipshod manner in which the sterilisations were conducted resulting in deaths and morbidities among the women.

On 8th and 10th November 2014, four sterilisation camps for women were held in Sakri Pendari, Gourella, Pendra and Marwahi, in Takhatpur block of Bilaspur district. Nearly 140 women were brought to these camps for sterilisation. The largest of these camps for 83 women was conductedwithin a short span of 3-4 hours, in the abandoned private charitable Nemichand Jain Hospital and Research Centre in Pendari. The building is located 6 kilometres from Bilaspur city. It is a non functional health facility that had been abandoned for the past many years.

Twelve of the 13 unfortunate deaths were of women who had undergone sterilisations in the camp held at the Nemichand Jain hospital building. Amongst those who died were women from dalit, adivasi / tribal and OBC (Other Backward Classes) communities. Most of the families were landless and their main source of income was daily-wage work. Many women who lost their lives had up to 3 children. Some of them, with infants as small as 3 months old, had undergone the sterilisation surgeries.

The surgeries were performed by Dr R. K. Gupta, a surgeon, who was assisted by a team of fellow medical professionals. Dr R.K. Gupta had been honoured previously by the State government for the ‘distinction’ of conducting the ‘maximum number of sterilisations’. Dr Gupta was subsequently arrested on charges of negligence and attempted culpable homicide following this tragedy. Indian Medical Association, Chhattisgarh Unit called for state wide strike on Saturday, 15th November, 2014 in support of Dr RK Gupta.

There were also reports of the women having fallen ill after consuming ciprofloxacin tablets that were provided to them following the surgeries at the Camp. State officials initially said that they believed that the women had contracted infections because of the poor conditions in the camp. It was also suspected that the ciprofloxacin tablets given to the women post-surgery were contaminated with zinc phosphide, a rat poison. The Police detained Ramesh Mahawar and Sumit Mahawar – father and son, who run Mahawar Pharmaceuticals Pvt. Ltd., a Chhattisgarh based pharma company, which supplied the ciprofloxacin. This is currently being investigated by the State government. While the post mortem reports have been kept under wraps, the officials suspected that it could well be a combination of both septicaemia and toxicity arising from the contaminated antibiotic.

Full Report: Camp of Wrongs: The Mourning Afterwards: A fact finding report on sterilisation deaths in Bilaspur

SC sets up 'Social Justice Bench' with the object to 'secure social justice'

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Supreme Court India

New Delhi: The Supreme Court today set up a special ‘Social Justice Bench’ to exclusively hear cases concerning social issues particularly those related to women, children and underprivileged saying that specialised approach is needed for dealing with these matters.

Emphasising that judiciary needs to be proactive to ensure early disposal of such cases and to bring fruits of the rights provided under the Constitution to people, the apex court set up the bench which will assemble every Friday at 2 PM from December 12.

“In Supreme Court several cases relating to the domain of social justice are pending for several years. Chief Justice of India is of the view that these cases shall be given a specialised approach for their early disposal so that the masses will realise the fruits of the rights provided to them by the constitutional text.”

“In this perspective his Lordship has ordered constitution of special bench titled as ‘Social Justice Bench’ to deal specially with the matters relating to society and its members, to secure social justice, one of the ideals of the Indian Constitution,” a press release issued by the apex court said.

The special bench will comprise justices Madan B Lokur and U U Lalit.

“Under the domain of social justice, several cases highlighting social issues are included.”

To mention summarily about the release of surplus foodgrains lying in stocks for the use of people living in the drought-affected areas to frame a fresh scheme for public distribution of foodgrains, to take steps to prevent untimely death of women and children for want of nutritious food, providing hygienic meal besides issues relating to children to provide night shelter to destitute and homeless, to provide medical facilities to all the citizens irrespective of their economic condition, to provide hygienic drinking water, to provide safety and secure living condition for the fair gender who are forced into prostitution etc.

“These are some of the areas where the Constitution mechanism has to play a proactive role in order to meet the goals of the Constitution,” the release said.

'Devastating': Suspension of food assistance threatens 1.7 million Syrians with hunger

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‘This couldn’t come at a worse time’

Street art by Syrian refugees in Iraq. Mural reads: "Hope gives wings to humanity." (Photo: Samantha Robison/ European Commission DG ECHO/flickr/cc)

Street art by Syrian refugees in Iraq. Mural reads: “Hope gives wings to humanity.” (Photo: Samantha Robison/ European Commission DG ECHO/flickr/cc)

by Andrea Germanos, Common Dreams

“This couldn’t come at a worse time,” stated UN High Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres.

Guterres’s comment is in response to the UN World Food Programme’s announcement Monday that it was suspending its food assistance to Syrian refugees as a result of a “funding crisis.”

The suspension of the program means that many of the over 1.7 million Syrian refugees in neighboring countries that had depended on the program’s food vouchers to buy food will now go hungry, the WFP states.

The suspension “will endanger the health and safety of these refugees and will potentially cause further tensions, instability and insecurity in the neighboring host countries,” stated WFP Executive Director Ertharin Cousin.

Many of the refugees are in Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, Iraq and Egypt, and already faced lack of access to necessary hygiene, clothing, shelter, and more.

With the cold winter season about to hit, these refugees may find themselves further on the brink, the agencies warn.

“Winter is already an extremely difficult period for Syrian refugees, but the suspension of food assistance at this critical juncture is going to be devastating,” Guterres’s statement continued.

The conflict that has gripped the country since 2011 has created over 3 million refugees—roughly half the country’s population. The UN refugee office has called it “the biggest humanitarian emergency of our era.”

As Common Dreams reported last month,

According to [Raed Jarrar, expert on Middle East politics and Policy Impact Coordinator for the American Friends Service Committee], a “real solution” to the refugee crisis does not lie in the “charitable” responses proposed by the UN, but in a long-term political and social response which engages and empowers people who are directly impacted by the violence. “The solutions for the displaced people is not resettlement or to keep them in limbo where they live,” argues Jarrar. “The real solution is to create the conditions at home to allow for a voluntary repatriation and deal with the root causes that displace them. That is the most important thing to focus on with this humanitarian crisis.”

Abuse, insult of Backward Castes may soon attract penal action

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Karnataka Social Welfare Minister H. Anjaneya

Karnataka Social Welfare Minister H. Anjaneya

Bengaluru: The State Government is considering a proposal to enact legislation aimed at preventing abuse of the backward classes on the basis of their caste, according to Social Welfare Minister H. Anjaneya.

A proposal to this effect has been made to the Law Department. “We are keen on it and we will take a call based on the department’s opinion,” the minister said on Monday.

A meeting of leaders from backward communities, intellectuals and writers, chaired by Social Welfare Minister H Anjaneya, resounded with vehement demands for a law to end abuse and insult of people belonging to the backward castes.

The meeting, on Monday, was held ahead of the launch of a caste-based census covering all of Karnataka. “Even today, seeing people of certain communities when setting out for important work is considered a bad omen. People engaged in some traditional vocations are insulted and abused by their caste names,” Anjaneya said, explaining the need for a new law.

“We are also considering banning the use of words that insult people belonging to certain castes. This is affirmative action to prevent caste discrimination,” the Social Welfare Minister added.

Surinder Koli must not be hanged: ACHR

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Surinder Koli

New Delhi: Asian Centre for Human Rights while releasing its report, “Death Reserved for the Poor” Monday stated that condemned prisoner, Surinder Koli, who was convicted and sentenced to death in the Rimpa Halder murder case must not be executed before conclusion of the trial in 11 other cases of the Nithari murders.

Koli’s case must be reviewed again in the light of the judgements in all the pending Nithari cases.

The stay on Koli’s execution by the Allahabad High Court expires on 1 December 2014.

“If Koli is executed, the families of the victims of 11 pending cases in which Koli is an accused shall be denied justice, which means nothing less than final conclusion of the trials. Further, if Koli is executed, co-accused Pandher will get inadvertent favour. As Koli remains in jail he does not pose any threat to society whatsoever, and there is nothing urgent which warrants his execution before the conclusion of the trials of all the pending cases.” – stated Suhas Chakma, Coordinator of the National Campaign for Abolition of Death Penalty in India.

The report concluded that it is the poor and uneducated who are disproportionately awarded death penalty as they are unable to defend themselves in the highly expensive legal system. On the other hand, the rich and well-connected criminals can sabotage the probe, intimidate, influence and induce witnesses, suppress evidence with money and muscle power, and abuse all the procedural rights, the report said.

The report highlighted a number of cases of miscarriage of justice including by the Supreme Court which had upheld death penalty to juveniles like Ram Deo Chauhan of Assam in 2000 and Ankush Maruti Shinde of Maharashtra in 2009 as the legal aid lawyers provided by the State did not raise the issue of juvenility before the Courts.

“If Ram Deo Chauhan and Ankush Maruti Shinde were from rich and educated families, such gross miscarriage of justice would not arisen.”- Mr. Chakma said.

Asian Centre for Human Rights recommended to the Government of India to grant mercy to all those who are defended by legal aid because of poverty in all stages of the trial and appeal, and further ensure that the trial courts appoint advocate/amicus curiae who have trial practices on the offences that the accused is charged with.

Bhopal sitting on 18,000 tonnes of toxic waste even 30 years after gas tragedy

by

Image from the movie Bhopal: A Prayer for Rain

Image from the movie Bhopal: A Prayer for Rain

by Sandeep Pouranik

Bhopal: The tens of thousands who survived the leak of methyl isocyanate (MIC) gas from the Union Carbide plant in Bhopal on the night of Dec 2-3, 1984 not only battle the after-effects but also live with an unsavoury legacy: 18,000 tonnes of toxic waste in the defunct plant that is polluting the environment and contaminating the soil and ground water.

The nearly 2,000 truckloads of the waste had been accumulating for nearly 15 years before the world’s worst industrial disaster struck, killing over 3,000 people immediately and thousands others over the years due to related causes.

Union Carbide had set up the pesticide plant in 1969. Twenty-one ponds were dug to dispose of the toxic effluent from the plant. The ponds were in use till 1977 when they proved to be inadequate due to the increasing volume of effluent from the plant. This necessitated a 32-acre solar evaporation pond, soon followed by two more such. Water from the effluent in these ponds got evaporated, leaving behind the harmful chemicals.

In 1996, waste from the three ponds was gathered in one pond and covered with soil. This waste exceeds 18,000 tonnes, Satinath Shadangi, a member of rights body Bhopal Group for Information and Action, told IANS.

It was only when various research showed that this waste was contaminating the soil and ground water and its spread was increasing over time that urgent steps were planned to destroy it, Shadangi said.

Alok Pratap Singh, who has been crusading for the rights of the victims of the gas tragedy, moved the Jabalpur High Court in July 2004 for disposal of the waste. The court constituted a task force to make recommendations on this.

In June 2005, the state government, as directed by the high court, tasked Ramky Enviro Engineers at Pithampur near Indore, to rid the Union Carbide plant of the waste. The company deposited 346 tonnes of pesticide and other chemicals and 39 tonnes of lime sludge in a warehouse in the pesticide plant.

As recommended by the task force, the high court in October 2006 ordered that the 385 tonnes of waste be incinerated at the Ankleshwar plant of Bharuch Environmental Infrastructure Limited in Gujarat. After widespread opposition to the move, the Madhya Pradesh government moved the Supreme Court in August 2008. In October 2009 the task force decided to send the waste to Pithampur in the state instead of Ankleshwar.

In January 2010, the Supreme Court directed that the waste be incinerated in Pithampur and asked the high court to oversee the entire process.

However, due to protests in villages surrounding Pithampur , the Madhya Pradesh government wrote to the central government in August 2010 expressing its inability to send the waste.

The central government moved the Madhya Pradesh High Court in May 2011 seeking a direction that the waste be incinerated at a Nagpur facility of the Defence Research and Development Organisation. The high court asked the state government to do so.

Then, on a plea of the Vidarbha Environmental Action Group, the Mumbai High Court in July 2011 stayed its counterpart’s order.

Officials of the pollution control boards of Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra met in February 2012 and decided that 346 tonnes of the waste would be incinerated at Pithampur.

In the meantime, a German company, GEZ, expressed interest in destroying the waste in Hamburg following which the central government moved the Supreme Court. The court directed the state government in April 2012 to send the waste to Germany, but later stayed this decision.

A Group of Ministers (GoM) also approved incineration of the waste in Germany. But this plan too had to be dropped due to opposition in that country. In October 2012, the GoM decided that the waste would be destroyed in Pithampur.

R.A. Khandelwal, commissioner, Bhopal Gas Tragedy Relief and Rehabilitation Department, told IANS: “The Supreme Court in April 2014 ordered that 10 tonnes of waste be incinerated at Pithampur on a trial basis.” However, due to technical glitches in the incinerator, the waste has not been sent to Pithampur.

It’s a different matter that American courts have been moved for damages, but the question that now begs an answer is: If 346 tonnes of waste cannot be disposed off, what happens to the remaining 18,000 tonnes lying buried in the solar evaporation pond and elsewhere in the plant.

(IANS)

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