Just like Maharashtra’s Dharavi or Worli Koliwada, now Chennai is facing a daunting task of containment after a sanitation worker has found to be Covid-19 positive in Thattankulam, one of the largest slums in the city with over 1,500 residents, reported Deccan Chronicle.
Containment zones or containment hotspots have been set up by the Greater Chennai Corporation across the city to prevent the spread of COVID-19. The zones are demarcated based on the identification of a positive case in a certain spot. If a person tests positive for COVID-19, the streets adjoining their place of residence is deemed a containment zone or containment hotspot. The area under that is divided into blocks of 100+ houses each.
The 37-year-old lady, who is currently admitted at the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital told DC that the hospital authorities phoned her on Tuesday night and apprised her of the results.
Her husband and children have also been sent to quarantine at the hospital.
The lady said that she was working as a sanitation worker at Egmore Railway Station and her samples were sent for testing a couple of days ago, after her supervisor tested positive for Covid-19.
She said, “I am so scared. But hospital authorities give me timely treatment. I have been accommodated with another lady who is also corona positive.”
Reported to be the first positive case from the congested slum, the news has sparked panic among other residents that the infection could spread rapidly, especially because it is difficult to ensure social distancing in such areas.
Local residents say fear has already made home in their hearts as at least 90 percent of residents don’t have private toilets. One seat of a public toilet is used by 70-80 slum dwellers daily.
Y Manikandan (38), a sanitation worker who stays in a single room house with his wife and four daughters at Street 13 of KM Garden, said people were very scared about the virus.
He said, “Since the news of positive case spread, many of my neighbours are very nervous and staying indoors. They choose to get out of their homes only to use public toilets. All of them say that it is very difficult to escape the infection in such congested slums.”
He adds, “Many people do not have food at home. There are 1,500 residents and 15 streets here apart from 500 residents in Thattankulam. People are desperate as the distribution of ration is irregular. So in search of provisions and food handouts, people are being forced to stay outside their homes for a long time. At places like ration shops people are still gathering in big numbers. So we are very afraid of a fast spread of the virus.”
The news comes at a time when there continues to be a spike in cases with the current number of cases at 373. There are a total of 112 containment zones declared across the city with 84 streets listed under all zones.
Dr. TG Srinivasan, health education officer, Greater Chennai Corporation said, “We are doing everything we can to make sure it does not explode and that there is no community spread, but it is a big challenge to contain this (virus spread). We are conducting awareness programmes across length and breadth of the city.”
According to data from the Chennai Corporation, as on April 16th, there were a total of 1,056,738 houses and 2,019,211 households under the containment zones across the city. Close to 12,000 officials have been appointed to carry out the task of monitoring and tracking people with Covid-19 on a daily basis in almost all homes under the containment zone, reported Citizen Matters.
As the lockdown in India continues in the hope of curbing the spread of the coronavirus, it has brought along a multiple problems with itself.
1. In Ranchi, Mohammed Imtiyaz, a grocer in his mid-30s lost his newborn daughter in the wee hours of Monday due to what he called overzealous cops enforcing the lockdown. A resident of Hindpiri’s Nizam Nagar area that is a containment zone, Imtiyaz was stopped twice by the police when he tried to take his pregnant wife to a hospital in his car around 1 AM on Monday this week.
Due to this, his wife, Nargis Parveen, had to deliver the baby at home with the help of a few women in the neighbourhood.
“The baby survived only for about half an hour,” Imtiyaz told The Telegraph on Tuesday. A sub-inspector had been suspended over the incident.
Holding back his tears, he told the publication, “The nearest hospital from our home is Seva Sadan at Upper Bazar, barely 600 metres from my home. If the baby was born there, things might have been different, the child might have lived.”
He said, “At a Nizam Nagar gate, the police told me to go back and get permission from some senior police official. I tried to go out from another road near the Marwari College, but was stopped again by another police team who said I had to arrange an ambulance.”
A distraught Imtiyaz added, “Unfortunately, my wife’s labour pains were so severe that there was no time to arrange an ambulance. Couldn’t cops understand that?”
Imtiyaz said that his first wife had died, leaving a daughter behind. “But this was Nargis’ first child. There are around 12 other pregnant women in our area. I humbly request the government to ensure these mothers-to-be don’t share my wife’s fate.”
2. In Bengaluru, a migrant woman labourer who had to deliver her child on a pavement, was given first aid by a dentist who also revived her newborn, Deccan Chronicle reported.
The incident took place on April 14. Shanti, from North India had walked seven kilometers looking for a hospital. She went into labour soon, but a clinic she found was shut, forcing her to deliver on the pavement. As the child didn’t respond, her husband wrapped it in a newspaper, assuming it had died.
However, Ramya Himanish, the dentist, descended like an angel to save the child and the woman. She noticed the woman lying on the pedestrian platform, bleeding and immediately took her to the clinic.
Dr. Ramya told reporters, “When I went there, I saw the woman bleeding. I brought her inside and provided treatment. Then I checked the baby. After the resuscitation process, the child came to life.”
She also summoned an ambulance and sent the woman with the newborn to a government hospital for further better treatment.
3. In Telangana too, a pregnant woman, who was in the last month of her pregnancy, walked 100 km and reached Kusumanchi mandal headquarters to go to her native place in Odisha from Hyderabad, along with her husband. She was rescued by police and revenue officials on Tuesday night and shifted to a hospital in Khammam, reported The Indian Express.
Sunita Sheel (27) and her husband Sridam Sheeel (37), residents of MV-79 village in Malkangiri district, Odisha, had arrived in Hyderabad three months ago to work as labourers. However, the contractors stopped paying them once work was halted due to the lockdown. Because they had no money and no transportation available, they started walking back to their native place.
A lorry driver saw her and offered them a lift after which he dropped the couple at Suryapet. They started walking from Suryapet again, and reached Kusumanchi in Khamman district. The police who was checking vehicles there, stopped them and put them with an organization that has been helping people in need.
4. Reflecting no respite to migrants, the Assam police on Wednesday intercepted a truck at Golakganj in Dhubri ferrying 39 migrant labourers to Bengal from Hojai. The labourers had lost their jobs and money due to the lockdown and were on their way home, reported the Telegraph India.
The labourers were detained and the Bengal police was contacted, but due to the lockdown, the police said it was not possible to take them all back. The Dhubri police then contacted the Hojai police and sent back all the labourers where they were to be quarantined at their respected places with all possible resources.
5. Citizens who are handicapped and depend on help by caregivers are facing a crisis during the lockdown. Most of them haven’t received financial help which was promised by the Centre and most don’t know whom to ask for it. The National Centre for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People (NCPEDP), a non-profit, recently shot off a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi asking him to look into difficulties faced by lakhs of disabled Indians, reported India Today.
Arman Ali, the non-profit’s executive director said, “The Rs 1,000 announced is for the entire three-month period which translates to Rs 333 per month for an individual. No one in the country has received the amount as yet.”
People who need medical attention find it difficult to get passes for caregivers owing to complicated procedures and lack of transportation. Thalassemia patients too are finding it difficult to get blood for transfusion.
For citizens of rural India, the problems are worse because there is no money coming in due to the lockdown and even two meals are a distant dream.
This is just a miniscule percentage of problems that are actually haunting people amid the lockdown. Nobody knows when and how, and if help will reach those in dire need.
Abeir Almasri, Human Rights Watch’s Gaza-based research assistant has recently shared her experience of being locked out of home during the lockdown in a blog on the organisation’s website. She says, “Two years ago, I obtained a rarely issued permit to leave Gaza for the first time in my life, at age 31, to travel to New York for Human Rights Watch. I’ve since obtained several other permits, including one earlier this year to attend meetings in Paris. My first time in Europe, I planned my first real vacation.”
The humanitarian crisis in Gaza is not a secret. Almost 1.5 million people are trapped in despair. The United Nations wrote about the same saying, “The restrictions on the free movement of people and goods imposed by Israel and Egypt and their drastic economic consequences are the main contributing factors, besides the military attacks, to the current humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip, as they seriously compromise people’s access to food, housing, energy and basic public services. It is also a violation of human rights.”
The people of Gaza have been living under an Israeli blockade. Civilian infrastructure has been damaged and any movement is fraught with risks and restrictions. Civilians are mostly dependent on international aid and the hope of a better future is dim.
So when Almasri travelled through Paris, she felt like a free bird, a prisoner out on bail. She said, “Friends and colleagues warned me that the Covid-19 pandemic could ensnare me in government-imposed lockdowns, but I was not bothered. After a lifetime caged in Gaza due to the generalized travel ban that Israel has enforced since 2007, which, with rare exceptions, robs two million Palestinians of their right to freedom of movement, and Egypt often sealing its border, what did I have to fear from some travel restrictions?”
However, with worsening conditions, the warnings grew dire and Almasri had to cut her trip short and decided to fly through Jordan to return to return to Gaza as Israel bars the entry of Palestinians from Gaza and the West Bank from using the Ben Gurion Airport without a permit.
However, she found herself locked in as soon as she arrived in Jordan after it imposed one of the world’s strictest lockdowns, banning the public from driving without a permit or leaving the house on foot some days, barring inter-city travel, and effectively closing its airports and border crossings.
Almasri is now stuck in Amman, where the almost nightly air raid sirens that signify the beginning of the curfew, remind her of repressed memories of the buzzing Israeli drones and F16 warplanes during the 2014 fighting in Gaza that left her “sheltering in place” for long stretches.
She’s unsure of when she’ll reach home. This lockdown will eventually open again, she says. “But Gaza’s two million Palestinians will remain in a man-made lockdown so long as Israel continues to impose its cruel closure,” she reckons.
At least 35 Bru refugees were booked under the Disaster Management Act, 2005, and Section 188 of the IPC (Disobedience to order duly promulgated by public servant) for violating the lockdown, reported the Telegraph India.
The North district administration of Tripura has registered a complaint against the 35 Bru refugees for entering Tripura through a jungle from Mizoram on April 15 and April 16, even as the lockdown was in place. The Tripura police have now intensified their vigil and deployed more personnel along the Tripura-Mizoram border.
A senior police officer told The Telegraph, “A case has been registered against 35 Bru people under the Disaster Management Act, 2005. All the 35 Brus entered Tripura on April 17 violating the lockdown. They bypassed all checkgates and came through the jungles from Mizoram. When they reached their camp at Naisingpara, only then we came to know. They said they had approval from a local council of Mizoram which is not valid. We have put them under quarantine at Kanchanpur ST boys’ hostel of Kanchanpur sub-division of the North district.”
District Magistrate Raval H Kumar said that the refugees were screened, were kept under quarantine and were asymptomatic.
He said, “These Bru inmates are from Naisingpara Bru camp at Kanchanpur sub-division of North Tripura. They are migrant labourers working in Aizawl. Now they are under quarantine and we will take legal action against all.” Scroll.in reported that the police informed that the 35 refugees were put under quarantine at a hostel in Kanchanpur sub-division of the North district.
Covid-19 nodal officer, Dr. Deep Kumar Debbarma said, “We have collected some samples from the Brus. The results are yet to come. And the second patient of the state who was found in Damcherra of North district is stable now.”
The second patient of the state was found in Damcherra village of the North district which is very close to the Mizoram border. According to data from the Union Health Ministry, the state currently only 1 active case up until now, with one person having recovered and no Covid-19 deaths have been reported from the state.
In January, a quadripartite agreement was signed between the Centre and State governments of Tripura and Mizoram and representatives of Bru organization, Mizoram Bru Displaced people’s Forum, allowing some 35,000 Bru tribals who had been displaced from Mizoram, to settle permanently in Tripura. The Brus were forced to leave Mizoram after facing ethnic violence there had been residing in Tripura in six relief camps in Tripura.
The Brus, also known as Reangs, are spread over the states of Tripura, Mizoram and southern Assam. Brus of Mizoram converted to Christianity, while Brus of Assam and Tripura are mostly Hindu. In 1995, clashes with the majority Mizos, led to the demand that Brus be removed from Mizoram’s electoral rolls as they were perceived to be non-indigenous. This had led to an armed movement by a Bru outfit, Bru National Liberation Front (BNLF) which led to the killing of a forest official in Mizoram. This in turn to retaliatory ethnic violence which saw more than 40,000 Brus fleeing to Tripura where they were houses in six relief camps in Kanchanpur and Panisagar subdivisions.
Disciplinary Action is being taken against the erring Police Officials. Appeal to observe the holy month of Ramzan as per the advisory given below to stay safe and follow lockdown in your and public interest: Delhi Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal
“Azaan ke liye bhi mana kar diya hai LG sahab ne. LG sahab ke order hain (azaan is also banned, these are the orders from the Lieutenant Governor )” two uniformed Delhi Police officials, took it upon themselves to tell the local muezzin at a mosque in Delhi’s Prem Nagar area, that azaan, or the Muslim call to prayers recited by a muezzin, was banned by the state’s Lt Governor a day before the month of Ramzaan began. This of course is not true. There is no ban on the call to prayers under the Covid19 lockdown. All religious gatherings, and congregational prayers have been banned and mosques, churches, temples, gurdwaras have already suspended them. The faithfull have been asked to pray at home.
However, the two Delhi Policemen’s decision to make additions to the list of banned activities has done the damage. The short video clip has since gone viral, where the cops are seen giving stern instructions to the Muezzin not to give the call to prayer. Two women can be heard reasoning with the cops that Ramzaan was starting soon and azaan was essential to let people know when to break their fast. They told the cops that no one was going to the masjids to pray and only the muezzin would give the call. “This is wrong, this is ramzan, the rozas (fasts) will be observed, there is no ban on Azaan, we see the news too,” reasoned the women. “Go and fight with LG. The LG has said no,” the policeman replied. “What is the problem? Is corona increasing with the azaan,” asked an exasperated woman.
“LG Sahab has said not one person will read the azaan,” the cop continues to chant his line ad nauseum. Not to be intimidated, the women continue to school him. The clip soon found its way to social media where users such as civil rights activist Navaid Hamid, president All India Muslim Majlis e Mushawaratm secretary S. Asian CouncilForMinorities tagged the authorities and tweeted “DelhiPolice (PS PremNagar) claims tht @LtGovDelhi has ordered to ban Azaan. Reports coming frm areas where Muslims r in minority tht policemen hav instructed Imam/Muezzin not to give Azan in Mosques. Muslims wld not accept any illegal directive. #Ramadan @ArvindKejriwal @CPDelhi”
@DelhiPolice (PS PremNagar) claims tht @LtGovDelhi has ordered to ban Azaan. Reports coming frm areas where Muslims r in minority tht policemen hav instructed Imam/Muezzin not to give Azan in Mosques. Muslims wld not accept any illegal directive. #Ramadan@ArvindKejriwal@CPDelhi
Senior journalist Saba Naqvi too shared the video, flagging the sensitive issue, “
Is azaan during #Ramzaan now not allowed in Delhi? These cops say it’s order of LG. Hear them. Video from riot affected mustafabad where many lost lives, home and shops.”
Is azaan during #Ramzaan now not allowed in Delhi? These cops say it’s order of LG. Hear them. Video from riot affected mustafabad where many lost lives, home and shops. pic.twitter.com/JlIkZ8qRyr
While the conversation between the cops and the Muslim citizens, heard in the video is not a shouting match, the stress it has caused, and the dangerous potential it has to fan communal flames is obvious. “This is yet another attempt to intimidate,” said a Muslim lawyer, “azaan is a call to prayer. This is a holy month for Muslims across the world. We will all pray within our homes,”. “Why are they trying to provoke us?” asked a student, “they keep finding one thing or the other to attack us with.”
“There is a greater design behind this,” added a Muslim activist, “it can have dangerous consequences, even riots if not shut down right now.”
A local resident says the cops action was to create a disturbance where there was none. “How is azaan a problem? Ramzaan is holy to us and comes only once a year. They cannot stop a call to prayer. It is a simple tradition.”
Hours later Anil Baijal, Lieutenant Governor of Delhi: posted this on Twitter: “Observe Ramazan while following the lockdown guidelines”
With not even a word to calm frayed nerves and set the record straight that he had not given any instructions to the policemen to stop muezzins from reciting the azaan to mark the end of each roza.
Delhi Minorities Commission wrote to Anil Baijil, Lt. Governor Delhi and Arvind Kejriwal, Chief Minister of Delhi, about prohibition of azaan in NCT mosques. DMC Chairman Dr Zafarul-Islam Khan raised the issue of banning azaan over loudspeakers in mosques in various parts of Delhi.
“The issue of azaan from mosques is very pressing due to the beginning of the month of Ramzan when Muslims fast and break their fast on hearing the azaan at sunset time. Ramzan is starting in Delhi tomorrow, April 25. The Commission has requested that azaan should not be banned from mosques while mosques will continue to meticulously follow the Covid19-restrictions on permitted numbers of people for any gathering and social distancing,” said Dr Khan.
No congregational prayers are being held in Delhi mosques since the lockdown but azaan, recited by a single muezzin has continued. The Commission sent notices to the DCPs of Dwarka and South districts to provide it a copy of any circular banning the azaan. “If it does not exist, allow azaan in mosques in their areas” stated Dr Khan.
On his part, Delhi’s Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia tried to add a touch of diplomacy by saying there was no ban on azaan, but during the lockdown there was a ban on going to the mosques for namaaz and the complete ban extended on congregational prayers of any other religion as well: “अजान के लिए कोई पाबंदी नहीं है. लॉकडाउन में मस्जिदों में नमाज़ के लिए इकट्ठा होने या किसी अन्य धार्मिक स्थल पर पूजा आदि के लिए लोगों के इकट्ठा होने पर पूरी तरह पाबंदी है.”
अजान के लिए कोई पाबंदी नहीं है. लॉकडाउन में मस्जिदों में नमाज़ के लिए इकट्ठा होने या किसी अन्य धार्मिक स्थल पर पूजा आदि के लिए लोगों के इकट्ठा होने पर पूरी तरह पाबंदी है. https://t.co/OxYGiqaIrR
— #DilKiPolice Delhi Police (@DelhiPolice) April 24, 2020
According to the newsportal The Quint Delhi Police PRO, Anil Mittal, has said the two cops seen in the video are being identified, “ and, an official DCP-level inquiry has been launched into the matter. With the month Ramzan starting on 25 April, people must offer Namaz and have Sehri at home.”
An activist said the cops may now say they were confused between ‘azaan’, and ‘namaz’. Perhaps the two policemen should have just stopped talking for a moment and listened to what the women were trying to tell them in the first place. After all, in the midst of the Covid19 lockdown Delhi Police does want to be known as “Dill Ki Police” https://twitter.com/DelhiPolice or is that a pun (un)intended?
In a huge victory for nine inmates of Assam’s infamous detention camps, CJP has managed to secure their conditional release allowing them to go home to their families. The inmates hail from Chirang and Bongaigaon districts and were lodged in detention camps in Kokrajhar and Goalpara. They were released on April 22.
CJP Assam state team coordinator Zamser Ali explains, “We had been working to secure the release of detention camp inmates since even before the May 2019 Supreme Court order allowed conditional release for those who had completed three years. And while we were successful in helping many people go back home, things picked up speed after the Supreme Court order on April 13, 2020 that reduced time served requirement to two years and sureity amount to just Rs 5,000/- from the previous Rs 1 lakh. After the SC order, the Gauhati High Court had also ordered on April 15, that maximum number of eligible detainees be released within a week.”
The nine people released are:
From Chirang:
1) Parbati Das: A 73-year-old woman from a Scheduled Caste who had been languishing behind bars at the Kokrajhar detention camp for 3 years, 7 months and 8 days.
2) Asthami Das: A 60-year-old woman who also hails from a Scheduled Caste and had spent 2 years, 2 months and 16 days at the Kokrajhar detention camp.
3) Shantibala Ray: A 60-year-old Koch Rajbongshi woman who spent 3 years, 7 months and 8 days in captivity at the Kokrajhar detention camp.
4) Khitish Singha: A 58-year-old Dalu tribal from an extremely impoverished background who spent 2 years, 10 months and 27 days behind bars at the Goalpara detention camp.
5) Bongshidhar Rajbongshi: A 63-year-old member of the Koch Rajbongshi community who is also from an extremely economically backward family, and had spent 2 years, 9 months and 18 days at the Goalpara detention camp.
6) Kiswar Barman: A 49-year-old Koch Rajbongshi man who had spent 3 years, 2 months and 29 days in captivity at the Goalpara detention camp.
From Bongaigaon:
1) Hellal Ali: A 70-year-old Muslim man who had spent 3 years behind bars at the Goalpara detention camp.
2) Chitta Ranjan Ghosh: A man who had previously been released on bail two years ago, but was sent back to the detention camp after the court ruled his school leaving certificate to be fake.
3) Gour Mandal: Who spent 2 years and 6 months in the Goalpara detention camp.
Apart from Zamser Ali, the efforts were also led by CJP senior team members Pranay Tarafdar, Nandu Ghosh and Abul Kalam Azad. Advocate Dewan Abdur Rahim, assisted by Advocate Jahera Khatun and Advocate Prity Karmakar, was also a key member of the team that also comprises hundreds of community volunteers, paralegals, assistants and drivers.
Explaining the logistics of operating during the lockdown, Zamser Ali says, “We had already done a lot of leg work and travelled to the villages of all the detainees on multiple occasions over the last one and half years. But when the lockdown was ordered, we could not stop our work. Also, we were engaged in providing rations and relief materials to impoverished people at the time. We managed to get permission for one vehicle for this purpose. Since the detainees’ families also comprise extremely poor daily wage earners who had lost their source of incomes and were facing starvation, we were able to provide two different forms of service to them.”
Nandu Ghosh, elaborated on the procedural hurdles faced by the team saying, “For every person who agrees to bail out a detainee, we have to get their ‘Jamabandi’ document (proof of land ownership), their land valuation document and their tax clearance document. All these had to be verified by government authorities who would often reject documents due to minor discrepancies causing us to run from the Mandal department in the Circle Office to the Sub Divisional Office (Civil) and back multiple times.”
Additionally, each bailor had to provide legacy data and certified copy of voters list and voter ID. Ghosh says many times the procedure took as long at four months to complete because they were made to jump through bureaucratic hoops. But the team remained patient, and did not budge.
“But we all got very emotional in the cases of Kshitish Singha and Bongshidhar Rajbongshi. Singha’s wife is ill and bed ridden. One of his children works in another state and is stuck there. The other child is in class five. They are extremely poor and helpless. In case of the Rajbongshi family, we discovered that they had been forced to go hungry for two consecutive days as supplies ran out and they did not have any source of income during the lockdown. Though we immediately provided them with rations, it was very difficult to get over what we saw that day,” recalls Nandu Ghosh.
Ghosh and Tarafdar often had to make multiple trips to far flung villages to help families with the documentation process and get bailors. “Many times, we would go to the village to help the families, but they would be out trying to find work. So, we would return at night, but by then they would have fallen asleep exhausted from toiling all day.”
Zamser Ali elaborates, “Often people would be reluctant to become bailors as nobody wants to get into the long drawn out process. Sometimes people would want to help, but they did not have adequate documents. There are 2500 people living near Kiswar Barman’s home in Phaisobari village who do not have a single permanent land patta (land ownership document). Around 3,000 people are living in the Borpathar village, where Bongshidhar Rajbongshi lives, but only 25 of them have permanent land patta documents. Most tribals don’t have permanent land pattas and basically depend on produce from the forest land. In many villages it is only the upper caste people who have them and they are usually unwilling to help detainees unless they can get something out of it.”
Explaining how CJP had to step in and often protect vulnerable families of detainees from bailors with ulterior motives, Zamser Ali says, “People would expect the family to turn over their land in exchange for help in securing the detainee’s release. They would then be expected to work as bonded labourers on this land. This is virtual slavery and we could not allow helpless people to be exploited like this!”
But the CJP team soldiered on, with the objective of protecting and defending the vulnerable people. At last, our perseverance paid off, and when word came that release was possible for these nine detainees, CJP swung into action and arranged for 6 vehicles to first take the bailors to complete the last leg of formalities at the office of the Superintendent of Police, and then to take the detainees back home.
“The night before the release neither Zamser da, nor I slept a wink as we meticulously went through all paperwork with our legal team with a fine-tooth comb to ensure nothing went wrong at the last minute. We left at 6 AM the next day and formalities at the Superintendent’s office got completed only around 11 PM. By the time the detainees were released it was midnight. Our community volunteers ensured that they were all dropped home, all the while maintaining social distancing measures,” says Nandu Ghosh.
“Because of social distancing, we could not have more than two detainees and a bailor in one vehicle, forcing us to make multiple trips. By the time everyone reached home, it was well past 2 AM! But we had to be responsible,” says Zamser Ali.
So far, through direct intervention by CJP, 15 people have been able to walk out of detention camps. The team is now gearing up for the release of five more people over the next seven days. Here is a powerful video of detainees after their release.
Meanwhile CJP volunteers and volunteer motivators have also worked closely with people from Prayash and Aikyatan, two local organisations, to help secure the release of 50 more people. Here is a list of people who have helped in this enormous endeavour. While some have physically run from pillar to post through this tedious process, gone door-to-door and helped with document collection, form filing and verification, many of the following people have provided much needed emotional support as well as support from outside:
Bipul Sarkar, Pijush Chakraborty, Papiya Das, Gauranga Karmakar, Raj Barman, Mohanbashi Das, Dilip Kumar Ray, Sayan Kumar Singha, Chirang District BJP General Secretary Rintu Kumar Das, Kalicharan Barman, Sukdev Rajbongshi, Prahlad Das, Krishna Das, Ashananda Mondal, Ajit Barman, Rakhal Rajbongshi, Kartik Debnath, Ranjit Mondal, Manoj Saha Mrinal Kanti Saha, Ratan Goswami, Raju Saha Mondal, Swapan Saha, Raju Ghosh, Sushankar Ghosh, Subhas Ghosh, Samir Ghosh, Amal Kanti Raha, Ujjal Ujjwal Bhowmick, Aminul Ahmed, Ananta Kalita, Rituraj Kalita, Shantiranjan Mitra, Ratish Deb, Ak Goldsmith, Teesta Setalvad, Pranjal Choudhury, Faruk Ahmed, Majidul Islam, Mubarak Ali, Sanjay Chakraborty, Amritlal Das Sushanta Kar, Har Kumar Goswami, Jamir Uddin Talukdar, Hasinus Sultan, Zesmin Sultana, Chitta Paul and many more.
Here are a few images showcasing the detainees and our team:
The environment ministry’s Forest Advisory Committee (FAC) discussed the issue of forest clearance for the Etalin Hydroelectric Project that requires the clearing of 2.7 lakh trees in what is described as a “subtropical evergreen broad-leaved forest and subtropical rain forest”, one of the most biodiverse Himalayan zones in Arunachal Pradesh’s Dibang Valley, reported the Hindustan Times.
Though the decision on granting forest clearance hasn’t been taken yet, a senior member of the FAC, on condition of anonymity, has told the media that most members have a favourable view of the project because it is a large “clean energy project” which can replace dirty energy.
HT reported on April 23 that a sub-committee of FAC which visited the site in February has recommended in its report dated April 21 that Etalin Hydroelectric Project of 3097 MW be allowed with a condition that the developer deposit money that will go towards wildlife conservation in the area.
According to the sub-committee which visited the site in February, the developer, Etalin Hydro-Electric Power Company, a joint venture of Arunachal Pradesh’s Hydro Power Development Corporation with Jindal Power Limited (JPL), has reduced the forest area needed to be diverted to 1150.08 ha from 1165.66 ha.
Mongabay India reported, “First envisaged in 2008, the Etalin hydropower project is proposed to be developed as a combination of two run-of-the-river schemes and involves the construction of concrete gravity dams on the Tangon and Dri rivers. It seeks diversion of about 1,165.66 hectares of forest area from the environment ministry. However, the area that is sought for diversion is classified as an “inviolate area” as prescribed by the environment ministry which is an area where no developmental project is allowed.”
In light of this, several scientists have written to the six-member FAC, citing a number of peer-reviewed studies that highlighted the ecological and biodiversity richness of the Dibang Valley. They asked the committee to assess the impact of all the hydropower projects in the region writing, “We’d like to kindly request you to direct the necessary agencies to conduct systematic studies on assessing the potential cumulative impacts of a run of the river projects on the riverine habitats and riverine birds before these projects are given clearance and before the river systems are permanently and irreversibly altered.”
In the same vein, they have asked citizens to come forward and sign off an email to the FAC, asking it to reject the forest clearance for the Etalin Project.
Asking citizens to address the below email to the Director General of Forests (dgfindia@nic.in), Additional Director General of Forests (adfgc-mef@nic.in), Inspector General of Forests (igfc-mef@nic.in) and non-official members of the FAC, Dr. Rajesh Kaushal (kaushalrajesh1@rediffmail.com ) and Suramya Vora, Ex – Additional Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (suramya.vora@gmail.com), they wish to save the pristine Dibang Valley from a destructive project.
The email reads –
Subject: Reject Forest Clearance for the Etalin Project
Respected Member of the Forest Advisory Committee,
I write to you as a concerned citizen of India and implore you to reject the forest clearance for the Etalin Hydropower Project. The project should not be viewed as a “clean energy” project, as it involves the destruction of a minimum of 270,000 trees in the Dibang Valley of Arunachal Pradesh. The Dibang Valley lies in a Global Biodiversity Hotspot and its old growth forests are irreplaceable. They harbour rich species diversity, including a unique, high altitude population of tigers.
Such forests are also crucial to public health and our fight against the climate crisis. In a letter by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change to the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, Environment Secretary C.K. Mishra acknowledges that “there is a consensus among scientists that a rise in zoonotic diseases like Nippa, Avian Influenza, Zika and Coronavirus is linked to loss of biodiversity and forest”.
Once lost, such complex ecosystems are irreplaceable. The Dibang Multipurpose Project has already been approved on the same Dibang River. It would be a tragedy if the Etalin Project is approved too.
I urge you to unanimously reject forest clearance for the Etalin Project.
Yours truly.
According to Mongabay India, the Dibang Valley houses 680 bird species – more than half of India’s total bird species. It is also home to tigers, the national animal of India.
Across India, especially in its Eastern parts, the homecoming of goddess Durga is celebrated with much enthusiasm by Bengali Hindus as the annual Durga Puja festival. One of the 108 avatars of the goddess is named Parvati often pronounced Parbati in these parts. So, when 73-year-old Parbati Das came back home from a detention camp in Assam with the assistance of CJP’s Assam team on April 22, her homecoming too was a deeply emotional affair.
Her son Biswanath was at a loss of words and tears won’t stop streaming down his face. Parbati too broke down at the sight of her son as she alighted from the vehicle CJP had arranged to drop her home. But after sometime, Parbati displaying a feistiness much like her namesake goddess and spiritedly denied the charge of being a foreigner. “They called me Bangladeshi and sent me to jail. I was born here in India on land owned by my father. I have never been to Bangladesh and don’t know anything about that country,” says the woman who was forced to live behind bars at the Kokrajhar detention camp.
CJP has been working to help secure the release of detention camp inmates who have completed the requisite amount of time behind bars in line with two Supreme Court orders that allow for their conditional release. The first order passed in May 2019 had stipulated that inmates who had spent three years in a detention camp could be released if they produced two sureties of Rs 1 lakh each. Another SC order issued on April 13, 2020, in wake of the Covid-19 pandemic reduced the amount of time served to 2 years and surety amount to just Rs 5,000/-.
PARBATI DAS WAITING TO BE RELEASED AS FORMALITIES ARE BEING COMPLETED AT THE OFFICE OF THE SUPERINTENDENT OF POLICE
We had first brought to you Parbati’s story when we met her son Biswanath during our tip to Assam in June 2019. At that time, CJP was leading a delegation of eminent lawyers and journalists to Assam to take stock of ground realities. Biswanath who is a rickshaw driver had then told us that her health was deteriorating in the detention camp and he pleaded with us to help with her release saying, “I don’t want her to die in captivity. I want her to be comfortable and loved amidst her family, in her home.” The family belongs to a Scheduled Caste and is extremely economically weak.
Parbati’s ordeal
A reference was made against Parbati in September 2005 at the Foreigners’ Tribunal at Dhubri. It was transferred in May 2008 to Bongaigaon when a new FT was set up there. Parbati missed the first few hearings, but made it to the FT on July 2, 2008 and submitted her documents. She missed a few other subsequent hearings but her submissions included a copy of her father’s ration card from 1949 and a copy of her father’s name in the electoral rolls of 1970. The Gaon Panchayat secretary had also issued her a link certificate (Gaon Burah certificate) which was also presented to build Parbati’s case. But Parbati was declared foreigner as she could not prove her linkage to her father.
Her father Sharat Chandra Das was considered ‘projected father’ by the FT. This is because of a discrepancy in her grandfather’s name on two different documents. The FT ruled that the Gaon Burah certificates were unreliable and that they do not establish Parbati’s link to her projected father. She was declared a foreigner and sent to the Kokrajhar detention camp. She was also denied bail by the Gauhati High Court.
CJP’s campaign for Parbati Das’s release
The CJP team immediately swung into action. Zamser Ali who leads the team in Assam says, “At first we had tried to get her released by filing a review petition against the Gauhati High Court order. Then after she had completed three years behind bars and became eligible for conditional release, we got to work finding sureties to secure her bail.”
But there were many hurdles in getting sureties. “Many people were reluctant. Even when we found people willing to help, the authorities would often reject their application due to different reasons. Sometimes the legacy data was missing, sometimes there was a discrepancy in the way the names were spelt in different documents, sometimes land patta was missing and sometimes there was a problem with the voter ID.”
CJP Team member Nanda Ghosh and Pranay Tarafdar played a key role in securing the release often running from the Mandal department of the Circle Office to the Sub Divisional Office (Civil) to make sure that the documents of the sureties were properly authenticated. These included the Jamabandi document (proof of land ownership), land valuation document and the tax clearance document. Ghosh recalls, “In most cases it would take three to four months. But in Parbati Das’s case it took us nine months. This is because we had managed to arrange for sureties once before, but they were rejected at the last minute by the authorities. So we had to get new sureties and start the entire process from the scratch once again.”
Apart from Zamser Ali, Nanda Ghosh and Pranay Tarafdar, CJP’s legal team comprising Advocate Dewan Abdur Rahim, Advocate Jahera Khatun and Advocate Prity Karmakar, also played a key role in securing Parbati Das’s release.
Parbati’s homecoming
But the CJP team’s persistence paid off, and finally on April 22, we were able to complete all formalities and Parbati Das was released along with eight others. Speaking of her ordeal in the camp Parbati says, “My senses had stopped working in there. I missed home.”
Describing the conditions in the camp Parbati said, “There was one room with walls on all sides and one door. They’d give us a rice meal and tea. They didn’t give us blankets at first and then when they did, they were prickly and worn out.”
She also told the CJP team that despite being back at home she had serious concerns about her livelihood. She also has concerns because her son suffers from a developmental disability. CJP is now trying to help the family find a sustainable source of income so that they are not forced to go hungry.
This poor old woman’s ordeal begs the question, what kind of danger did this gray-haired toothless granny pose to anyone? Even if the right-wing supremacist forces peddle the “ghuspethia” or “infiltrator” narrative, are we going to suspect women like Parbati Das of terrorism now, or are we the terrorists striking fear in the hearts of frail old women… forcing them to live, rot away and die in detention camps?
Image Courtesy:deccanchronicle.com
