The agitation, organised under the banner of the Kanda Utpadak Shetkari Kranti Mahamorcha, drew large participation from onion growers across Nashik — one of India’s largest onion-producing regions — and was supported by leaders of the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), including Rohit Pawar, Harshvardhan Sapkal and Ambadas Danve.

Demonstrations by different lots of farmers in a few thousands at the APMC’s procurement offices across districts culminated in a 10,000-strong blockade on the highway with several thousand being detained/arrested by the police. Apart from the protesting farmers, Opposition leaders who stood with protesting farmers in support were also detained. Harshvardhan Sakpal, President of the Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee (MPCC), Rohit Pawar, Member of Vidhan Sabha (MLA) from Karjat from the NCP-Sharad Pawar (NCP-SP) and Ambadas Danve, former Leader of the Opposition in the State Assembly from Shiv Sena-Udhav Thackeray.

According to a report published by Rural Voice, nearly 1,500 farmers gathered in Chandwad town and temporarily blocked traffic on the highway while demanding remunerative prices for onions amid a steep crash in market rates. Farmers argued that the current prices being offered in markets are far below their production costs and have pushed cultivators into severe distress. The report noted that onion wholesale inflation has remained negative since March 2025, while retail inflation has stayed negative since May 2025, reflecting a prolonged decline in prices that has sharply reduced farmer earnings.

Across several other media reports, farmers repeatedly highlighted the widening gap between cultivation costs and market returns. The New Indian Express reported that onion growers were demanding procurement at ₹32 per kilogram while prevailing market prices in parts of Maharashtra had reportedly crashed to as low as ₹4–6 per kilogram. Farmers and opposition leaders argued that the current rates are insufficient even to recover the cost of seeds, fertilisers, labour, storage and transport.

The immediate trigger for the protest was the Centre’s announcement of onion procurement through NAFED and NCCF at revised rates of approximately ₹1,580 per quintal. Farmer groups rejected the procurement price as grossly inadequate. Speaking during the protest, several cultivators stated that onion production itself costs roughly ₹1,800–2,000 per quintal, making the government’s procurement rate economically unviable. The Hindu quoted one farmer saying that cultivators were “not even able to recover the cost of production after selling onions.”

Farmer organisations demanded that procurement prices be increased substantially, with various groups seeking rates between ₹2,400 and ₹3,000 per quintal. Protesters also called for compensation for farmers who had already sold onions at distress prices over recent months. Reports in National Herald, Mid-Day and The Times of India noted that growers additionally demanded expanded procurement operations across onion-producing talukas, direct intervention in markets, and stronger implementation of price deficiency payment schemes.

The protest also reflected growing anger over repeated export restrictions imposed on onions over the past several years. Farmers alleged that unstable export policies and sudden government interventions had weakened India’s onion trade and severely damaged farmer incomes. According to The Hindu, opposition leaders argued that international markets, including Bangladesh, had increasingly reduced onion imports from India due to inconsistent export policies.

The demonstrations quickly escalated into a large-scale highway blockade. Multiple media outlets, including The Times of India and The Economic Times, reported that protesters marched from the Chandwad APMC to the Mumbai–Agra highway, blocking traffic for nearly 90 minutes to two hours. Long queues of vehicles formed on both sides of the road as farmers raised slogans, dumped onions onto the highway and wore garlands made of onions as a symbol of their distress.

Some protesters also distributed Melody toffees during the agitation in a symbolic political gesture directed at the Prime Minister after recent public attention around the confectionery brand. The Economic Times reported that protesters sarcastically remarked that if onions were promoted in the same way, perhaps their prices too would rise.

Police later intervened and detained several protesters and opposition leaders, including Harshvardhan Sapkal (INC) Rohit Pawar (NCP-SP), and Ambadas Danve (SS-UBT). According to The Times of India, more than 300 police personnel, including riot control units, were deployed to manage the situation. The report stated that over 50 protesters were detained under provisions of the Bombay Police Act before being released later.

While authorities alleged that some protesters attempted to deflate the tyres of stranded vehicles, opposition leaders claimed they had instructed demonstrators not to target ambulances, public transport or ordinary civilians. Nevertheless, the confrontation underscored the intensity of frustration among onion growers, many of whom say they have been trapped in recurring cycles of debt, price crashes and policy uncertainty.

Importantly, the Nashik protests are not an isolated flashpoint. They reflect a broader agrarian crisis that has repeatedly surfaced in Maharashtra’s onion economy over the past decade. Farmers participating in the agitation argued that while the costs of cultivation have steadily increased due to fertilisers, pesticides, labour, transport and storage expenses, government interventions have largely focused on controlling consumer prices rather than ensuring farmer incomes.

Several farmer leaders warned that continuing distress sales and unstable pricing policies could intensify indebtedness and deepen the agrarian crisis across onion-producing regions of Maharashtra. As protests spread beyond Nashik into areas including Sambhaji Nagar and Solapur, the demonstrations have once again drawn national attention to the fragile economics of onion cultivation — a sector where even minor policy shifts can determine whether farmers survive a season or sink further into debt.

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The post “₹4 a Kilo for a Crop That Costs ₹20 to Grow”: Nashik’s onion farmers erupt in protest over deepening price crisis appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Appearing before a Bench comprising Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, Justice Joymalya Bagchi and Justice Vipul Pancholi, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta stated that the Union had decided, “keeping in view the peculiar facts and circumstances of the case,” to facilitate the return of the deported individuals and examine their claims to Indian citizenship in accordance with law.

“My instructions are, the Government will bring them back, and thereafter will examine their status, and depending on the outcome, will take steps accordingly,” the Solicitor General submitted before the Court, reported LiveLaw.

Senior Advocate Sanjay Hegde, appearing for the affected individuals, urged the Court to formally record the Union’s assurance. The Solicitor General agreed, while clarifying that the statement was being made in the exceptional circumstances of the present case and should not be treated as a precedent for future matters involving deportation or citizenship disputes.

As per LiveLaw, recording the submission, the Supreme Court passed an order stating: “The Solicitor General of India submits that keeping in view the peculiar facts and circumstances of the case, and by not treating it as a precedent to be followed in other instances, the Government of India has decided to bring the respondents back to India and to verify the claim of Indian citizenship. Their continuation in India will depend on the outcome of such enquiry.”

The Solicitor General informed the Bench that the process of bringing the individuals back from Bangladesh could take approximately eight to ten days.

The proceedings arise out of a series of habeas corpus petitions concerning Bengali-speaking families who were deported to Bangladesh in June 2025 during identity-verification operations allegedly conducted under a Ministry of Home Affairs directive. In September 2025, the Calcutta High Court had directed the repatriation of several deported persons, including Sunali Khatun, her husband Danish Sekh and their minor son Sabir Sekh, as well as Sweety Bibi and her two sons, Kurban and Imam. The High Court had sharply criticised the “hot haste” with which the deportations were carried out, observing that the affected individuals were removed without adequate inquiry, without a meaningful opportunity of hearing, and in apparent violation of procedural safeguards contained in the Union Government’s own guidelines.

The present development marks a substantial shift in the Union’s position. Earlier, in December 2025, the Centre had agreed to facilitate the return of Sunali Khatun—who was then in an advanced stage of pregnancy—and her young son on what it described as “purely humanitarian grounds.” At the time, the Supreme Court had underscored the need to balance legal enforcement with humanitarian considerations, remarking that some situations required “law to bend to humanity.”

That earlier intervention had followed disturbing findings by the Calcutta High Court regarding the manner in which the deportations were executed. According to the pleadings before the High Court, the affected families, originally from West Bengal but residing in Delhi for livelihood, were detained during an identity-verification exercise and deported to Bangladesh within five days. The High Court had noted that documentary material, including electoral records relating to the deportees’ family members, prima facie indicated Indian lineage and warranted a fuller inquiry before any coercive action could be taken.

While the Union Government has consistently maintained that the deportations were lawful and that the citizenship claims remain disputed, Friday’s undertaking before the Supreme Court indicates that the affected individuals will now be given an opportunity to establish their nationality status within India before any further steps are contemplated.

Related:

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The post Bhodu Sekh Case: Union agrees before Supreme Court to repatriate deported Bengali-speaking individuals pending citizenship inquiry appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Yet from the start of the protests in April 2026, the state attempted to reduce the protests into something smaller, narrower, and more criminal than they actually were. What was unfolding in Noida was not merely a law-and-order disturbance. It was not an irrational outbreak of mob violence. Nor was it simply a reaction to one wage notification.

It was the culmination of years of accumulated distress inside India’s industrial economy. The protests represented the eruption of long-suppressed anger over stagnant wages, forced overtime, unsafe working conditions, contractual exploitation, rising inflation, arbitrary deductions, labour insecurity, and the collapse of institutional mechanisms through which workers could negotiate with employers.

For perhaps the first time in years, the invisible workforce powering India’s manufacturing economy forced itself into national visibility. In addition, the state responded not with dialogue or labour mediation — but with policing, criminalisation, conspiracy narratives, mass FIRs, detentions, and coercive force.

That response revealed something fundamental about the contemporary Indian political economy: labour unrest is increasingly treated not as a democratic or industrial issue but as a security threat.

The industrial glory of Noida was built on invisible and disposable labour

For more than two decades, Noida and Greater Noida have been projected by governments, investors, and industry bodies as symbols of India’s industrial transformation — sprawling manufacturing corridors representing export growth, technological expansion, and integration into global supply chains. Electronics assembly plants, garment export units, pharmaceutical industries, footwear factories, automobile ancillary hubs, and mobile-phone manufacturing facilities turned the region into one of North India’s most important industrial belts.

Political speeches, investment summits, and corporate campaigns repeatedly celebrated Noida as evidence of India’s emergence as a global manufacturing destination under initiatives such as “Make in India.” But beneath this image of industrial modernity existed a vast labour regime built upon invisibility, insecurity, and disposability.

The industrial economy of Noida depended overwhelmingly on migrant labourers arriving from Bihar, eastern Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, Bengal, Odisha, Assam, and other economically distressed regions. These workers migrated not because industrial employment guaranteed stability, but because rural economies increasingly offered little possibility of survival amid agrarian distress, shrinking agricultural incomes, indebtedness, and chronic unemployment.

Once inside Noida’s industrial ecosystem, many workers entered conditions defined by insecurity, overcrowding, exhausting work schedules, and near-total absence of bargaining power. As The Times of India reported during the protests, large numbers of workers employed across electronics factories, garment units, footwear industries, and ancillary manufacturing facilities earned roughly between ₹11,000 and ₹13,000 per month despite routinely working extended shifts. Workers and labour organisers told the newspaper that shifts regularly stretched beyond eight hours, often reaching 10–12 hours during periods of intense production demand.

Several workers alleged that overtime had effectively become compulsory. According to accounts cited in The Indian Express, workers frequently began shifts early in the morning and returned late at night after exhausting factory schedules, leaving little time for sleep, recovery, or family life. In many factories, labourers alleged that refusal to comply with overtime expectations risked threats, penalties, or removal from work rosters.

The wage structure itself revealed the depth of economic exploitation. Even before deductions, monthly wages barely sustained survival within NCR’s rapidly rising cost of living. After accounting for rent, transport, food, electricity, and remittances sent back to families in villages, many workers reportedly retained almost nothing by the end of the month.

Contract labour became the central mechanism of industrial control

One of the clearest realities exposed by the Noida protests was that the industrial economy of NCR no longer functions primarily through stable, direct employment. Instead, it increasingly operates through a vast contract labour regime that allows industries to maximise production while minimising accountability.

The modern factory system in Noida is built not merely on low wages, but on deliberately structured insecurity.

Across electronics factories, garment export units, footwear industries, pharmaceutical facilities, automobile ancillary plants, and mobile-phone assembly units, workers repeatedly stated during the protests that they were employed not directly by companies but through contractors, labour suppliers, manpower agencies, and intermediaries who controlled recruitment, attendance, wages, discipline, and dismissals. Reports by Hindustan Times described these intermediaries as effectively functioning as “shop-floor fixers” operating between management and labour.

This structure was not incidental to industrial production. It became central to the organisation of industrial power. The contractor system served several purposes simultaneously:

• insulating companies from direct legal liability,
• fragmenting workers into unstable categories,
• weakening collective bargaining,
• discouraging unionisation,
• and ensuring labour remained permanently replaceable.

Workers repeatedly described how insecurity itself became a mechanism of industrial discipline, as reported by The Wire.

Many alleged they had no written contracts and could be removed from work without explanation. Others stated that labourers were routinely terminated before they became eligible for statutory protections, bonuses, provident fund benefits, or wage increments. Accounts documented in reports by The Indian Express and labour organisers covering the protests suggested that the fear of sudden dismissal had become normalised inside factories.

The figures cited during the protests were staggering:

• 58.2% of workers reportedly had no written employment contract,
• 51.7% lacked social security protections,
• over 47% were not entitled to paid leave.

These numbers revealed something fundamental about Noida’s industrial economy: Insecurity was not exceptional. It had become structural.

Even inside formally organised manufacturing systems linked to major domestic and international supply chains, workers increasingly existed in conditions resembling informal labour.

Reports emerging during the protests, including coverage by Scroll and labour-rights commentators, repeatedly highlighted how contractualisation fragmented workers inside the same factory. Workers performing identical labour often belonged to different employment categories depending on the contractor through whom they were hired. This meant different wage structures, different entitlements, and different levels of vulnerability despite identical work on the same production lines. The contractor system therefore did more than reduce labour costs. It actively prevented worker solidarity.

Workers alleged that attendance systems were manipulated, overtime compensation arbitrarily reduced, and deductions imposed without transparency. Multiple reports documented complaints regarding deductions for aprons, uniforms, slippers, safety equipment, and even questionable “ITI diploma” schemes that workers believed either did not exist or offered no meaningful educational benefit.

Several workers reportedly told journalists and labour organisers that raising complaints about overtime, wage deductions, or conditions could lead to immediate removal from work rosters. This fear was economically devastating for migrant workers. For labourers supporting families in villages while surviving in rented industrial settlements around Noida, losing employment could immediately trigger hunger, debt, or eviction.

As per The Caravan, women workers faced particularly severe vulnerabilities inside this structure. Reports by independent media platforms and labour groups documenting the protests described complaints regarding overcrowded and unhygienic toilets, inadequate sanitation facilities, and dismissive responses from supervisors when concerns were raised. Contractual insecurity also made reporting harassment or abuse significantly more difficult because workers feared retaliation or dismissal.

The Noida protests therefore exposed how contractualisation had fundamentally transformed industrial relations in India. The contractor system was no longer merely a labour arrangement. It had become the primary architecture through which industrial discipline, labour suppression, and economic control were maintained across India’s manufacturing economy.

Inflation turned low wages into a survival crisis

The immediate economic context behind the protests was critical. By early 2026, industrial workers across the NCR region were already under immense financial pressure. The energy crisis triggered by geopolitical tensions in West Asia and disruptions around the Strait of Hormuz sharply increased fuel prices across India. LPG costs surged, transport became more expensive, and food inflation intensified dramatically.

For workers already surviving on stagnant wages, the consequences were devastating. Indian Express and The New Indian Express repeatedly documented workers explaining how monthly wages no longer covered basic survival expenses. Rent alone reportedly consumed one-third to half of monthly income for many migrant labourers living in overcrowded industrial settlements around Noida and Greater Noida.

One worker described returning to cooking on a wood-fired chulha because LPG cylinders had become unaffordable. Others explained that after paying rent and transport expenses, almost nothing remained for food, healthcare, or family support.

The protests therefore emerged from material desperation. This was not abstract labour dissatisfaction. Workers were confronting the collapse of subsistence itself. The erosion of real wages had become impossible to ignore. Even as industrial productivity increased and companies expanded production, workers experienced declining purchasing power and worsening living conditions. The industrial economy demanded more labour from workers while giving them less capacity to survive. That contradiction produced explosive anger.

Haryana’s wage hike triggered an explosion that was already building

The immediate trigger for the Noida uprising came from neighbouring Haryana. After sustained labour unrest and wage-related mobilisation across industrial centres such as Manesar, Gurugram, and Faridabad, the Haryana government announced a substantial increase in minimum wages in April 2026. As per The Hindu, the revised wage rates reportedly increased minimum pay for unskilled workers from roughly ₹11,000–11,300 to more than ₹15,000 per month.

The announcement spread rapidly through worker WhatsApp groups, labour settlements, contractor networks, factory dormitories, and informal worker circles across Noida and Greater Noida. Its political impact was immediate. Workers across industrial belts in Uttar Pradesh began directly comparing their wages with those offered in neighbouring Haryana for nearly identical work.

The question emerging inside factories was devastatingly simple: Why were workers producing for the same industrial economy being paid thousands less simply because they worked across a state border?

This comparison carried enormous political force because Noida, Greater Noida, Gurugram, Manesar, and Faridabad do not function as isolated industrial regions. They form part of an interconnected NCR manufacturing ecosystem where labour, contractors, and production networks constantly move across state boundaries. Workers assembling electronics, garments, automobile components, footwear products, or mobile phones in Noida often performed labour nearly identical to workers employed in factories in Manesar or Gurugram. Yet wage structures differed dramatically.

Coverage by Scroll, and worker testimonies documented by independent labour-rights groups highlighted how workers increasingly viewed this disparity as evidence of deliberate labour suppression rather than economic necessity. The comparison with Haryana transformed workplace dissatisfaction into political anger. Workers and labour organisers reportedly argued that industrial competitiveness in Uttar Pradesh increasingly depended upon keeping labour cheaper, more weakly protected, and less organised than neighbouring states.

This was one of the most important dimensions of the protests. The Noida unrest rapidly became about far more than a single wage revision. It exposed a broader development model in which states compete for industrial investment by suppressing labour costs, expanding contractualisation, weakening collective bargaining structures, and maintaining a permanently insecure workforce.

The collapse of labour institutions left workers with only the streets

One of the deepest structural causes behind the unrest was the collapse of institutional labour negotiation mechanisms. Historically, industrial disputes in India were mediated through trade unions, labour commissioners, conciliation systems, industrial tribunals, and collective bargaining processes. Those systems have steadily weakened.

Reports by Article 14 and others repeatedly noted that workers today possess very few effective institutional avenues through which grievances can be meaningfully addressed. The weakening of trade unions combined with the expansion of contract labour fragmented workers and undermined collective organising.

As a result, workers increasingly felt that no institutional mechanism existed through which employers or the state would seriously engage with their grievances. This is crucial to understanding the escalation in Noida. The unrest did not emerge because workers suddenly became violent or irrational. It emerged because institutional channels for labour negotiation had been systematically hollowed out.

Workers turned to the streets because the structures historically meant to mediate industrial conflict had largely collapsed. The tragedy is that the state itself helped weaken these institutions — and then responded to the resulting unrest through coercion instead of reconstruction.

 Labour Codes deepened worker anxiety and distrust

The protests also unfolded against the backdrop of the implementation of the four Labour Codes in late 2025. The Codes covering wages, industrial relations, occupational safety, and social security were promoted as reforms intended to modernise labour regulation and improve ease of doing business. But workers and labour scholars increasingly viewed them differently.

Many feared that the reforms weakened labour protections while expanding managerial power and flexibility.

Labour economist K.R. Shyam Sundar noted in The Indian Express that the new framework created uncertainty regarding working-hour limits and increased executive discretion in labour regulation. Workers repeatedly alleged that “flexibility” effectively meant longer hours, increased overtime pressure, and weaker enforcement of labour standards.

The old Factories Act imposed clearer restrictions on daily working hours and spread-over limits. Critics argued that the new framework diluted these protections under the language of reform. Importantly, many workers reportedly expected the Labour Codes to improve wages and standardise protections after their implementation in November 2025. When these expectations were not realised, frustration deepened dramatically. Workers increasingly perceived labour reform not as protection but as deregulation in favour of industrial capital.

The critical appraisal of the new labour codes may be read here.

The state reframed a labour crisis as a security threat

Perhaps the most alarming feature of the Noida protests was how rapidly the Uttar Pradesh government transformed what was fundamentally a labour and economic crisis into a security operation. From the very beginning, the state appeared far more willing to investigate conspiracy than exploitation.

Instead of foregrounding the actual grievances driving workers onto the streets — stagnant wages, inflation, contractual exploitation, unpaid overtime, unsafe working conditions, arbitrary dismissals, and collapsing labour protections — the official response increasingly shifted toward the language of destabilisation, subversion, and law-and-order threat.

As reported across The Hindu, senior officials and police authorities repeatedly suggested that “outside forces” and organised conspirators were responsible for the unrest.

Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath publicly suggested that “urban naxalites” and disruptive actors were attempting to provoke industrial instability. Simultaneously, sections of the police and administration alleged that Pakistani social media handles had amplified misinformation surrounding the protests.

This framing was not politically neutral. It fundamentally altered the meaning of the protests themselves. Workers demanding dignified wages and humane working conditions were no longer treated primarily as citizens articulating economic grievances. They were increasingly portrayed as potential instruments of destabilisation.

The implication was deeply dangerous: Large-scale labour mobilisation itself became suspicious. The state effectively suggested that worker anger on such a scale could not emerge organically from economic suffering and structural exploitation. Instead, unrest had to be explained through hidden instigators, ideological infiltration, foreign amplification, or organised conspiracy. This reflected a broader political tendency increasingly visible across India — the securitisation of democratic dissent.

Economic protest was not treated as evidence of policy failure, labour distress, or institutional collapse. It was reframed as a threat to public order and industrial stability. This shift carried enormous consequences.

Once labour unrest was classified as a security problem rather than a social or economic issue, coercive policing became easier to justify while structural questions about wages, labour protections, and exploitation were pushed into the background.

Coverage and commentary emerging during the protests in Scroll.in repeatedly warned that this narrative erased workers’ own political agency. The implication was that workers themselves were incapable of collectively resisting exploitation unless manipulated by hidden actors.

Historically, this has been one of the most common methods used by states to delegitimise labour movements. By converting economic anger into conspiracy, governments avoid confronting the structural conditions that produced the unrest in the first place.

The tragedy of the Noida response was that it prevented any serious political engagement with the actual realities workers were describing: impossible living costs, wage stagnation, contractor exploitation, unsafe workplaces, and the collapse of labour negotiation mechanisms. The more the state emphasised conspiracy, the less it spoke about labour. And that silence revealed the deeper priorities underlying the response.

Detailed report on fact finding on Noida protest may be read here.

Police repression became the state’s primary language

As the protests intensified around April 13, the state moved decisively away from negotiation and toward coercive suppression. What began as labour unrest was increasingly met with the machinery of criminal law, mass policing, surveillance, and punitive force.

Reports emerging from Noida and Greater Noida in Hindustan Times described widespread lathi charges, raids, detentions, arrests, and sweeping FIRs filed against workers and unnamed persons allegedly involved in the protests. Workers and activists repeatedly alleged that police intervention escalated confrontations that had initially been localised and economically driven.

Instead of functioning as mediators attempting to reduce tensions, police operations increasingly appeared designed to demonstrate overwhelming state control. The scale of criminalisation was extraordinary.

According to reports emerging during the crackdown from The Indian Express, police registered cases against thousands of unnamed persons under serious penal provisions including rioting, unlawful assembly, destruction of property, and attempt to murder. Entire working-class neighbourhoods reportedly came under fear and surveillance.

Workers described police raids in labour settlements late at night. Families reportedly searched desperately for detained relatives without clear information regarding where they had been taken. Independent reports and labour-rights accounts alleged that minors and uninvolved persons were also picked up during police operations conducted across industrial localities.

Accounts emerging from detention facilities and Kasna jail raised serious constitutional concerns. Lawyers, labour organisers, and civil-rights activists cited in reports by Scroll.in alleged violations of Articles 21 and 22 of the Constitution, including arbitrary detentions, denial of timely legal access, failures to promptly inform families, and procedural irregularities surrounding arrests.

What was particularly striking was the collective nature of the crackdown. The policing increasingly resembled punitive action directed not only at specific accused individuals but at labour communities themselves. Fear spread rapidly through worker settlements across Noida and Greater Noida. The message being communicated by the state was unmistakable: Collective resistance would invite overwhelming coercive force.

This was especially significant because the protests themselves emerged from the collapse of institutional labour mediation mechanisms. Workers had already reached a point where they felt trade unions, labour departments, and industrial dispute systems no longer meaningfully addressed their grievances. The state’s response to this institutional collapse was not reconstruction of dialogue, rather it was criminalisation.

The criminalisation of labour solidarity was equally significant

The crackdown did not remain confined to workers physically present at protest sites. Very quickly, the focus of police action expanded toward labour organisers, student activists, writers, independent voices, and individuals publicly expressing solidarity with workers. What made this phase of the crackdown especially alarming was that the state increasingly appeared to treat labour organising itself as suspicious political activity.

The shift became particularly visible through the arrests and prosecutions that followed the April 13 protests. As reported by The Indian Express, police repeatedly alleged that the unrest had not emerged organically from worker anger but had instead been orchestrated by an “organised syndicate of outsiders.” Authorities claimed that labour organisers and activists associated with groups such as Mazdoor Bigul Dasta played a “significant role” in provoking violence, disrupting public order, and inciting workers.

This narrative became central to the state’s justification for the crackdown. Among the most prominent cases was that of Aditya Anand, a 28-year-old BTech graduate from National Institute of Technology Jamshedpur and an employee at Genpact, whom police described as a “mastermind” behind the Noida protests. As reported by The Indian Express, Anand was arrested from Tiruchirappalli in Tamil Nadu on April 18 and later linked by Haryana Police to separate labour unrest and violence in Manesar that had occurred four days before the Noida protests.

Police alleged that Anand delivered “provocative speeches,” organised marches, and encouraged workers to block roads. He was booked under multiple serious provisions, including rioting, unlawful assembly, assault on public servants, criminal conspiracy, and attempt to murder. Yet the details emerging about Anand’s background complicated the state’s narrative considerably.

His family described him not as a violent conspirator but as someone deeply engaged with labour issues and social movements. His younger brother told The Indian Express that Anand had rejected job opportunities abroad, including in Sweden, because he wanted to remain in India and work on issues affecting ordinary people. The family stated that he had long been associated with labour concerns and youth activism linked to the Naujawan Bharat Sabha, the organisation historically associated with Bhagat Singh.

The symbolism here was politically significant. A labour activist speaking publicly about workers’ rights was increasingly being framed through the language of criminal conspiracy and organised disorder. The crackdown intensified further in May when authorities invoked the stringent National Security Act against two accused linked to the protests: Aakriti Chaudhary, a 25-year-old history graduate from Delhi University, and former journalist Satyam Verma.

The use of the NSA marked a dramatic escalation. Preventive detention laws of this nature are generally associated with threats to national security or public order of an exceptional nature. Their invocation against individuals associated with labour protests and worker solidarity immediately raised concerns among civil-rights groups and labour organisations.

According to The Indian Express, police alleged that Chaudhary and Verma were active members of Mazdoor Bigul Dasta and had played “significant roles” in violence, arson, and disorder during the protests. But the accounts emerging from families and lawyers sharply challenged this narrative.

Aakriti Chaudhary’s father reportedly stated that she had been picked up from Botanical Garden Metro station on April 11 — two days before the violence on April 13 — raising serious questions about the chronology of the allegations against her. Her family argued that she had merely participated in activities supporting workers’ rights.

Her father, who works with Ganashakti, the CPI mouthpiece, told The Indian Express: “I’m proud that my daughter was raising her voice for workers’ rights. She is the Bhagat Singh of today.”

Similarly, advocates representing other accused argued that students and social workers had merely expressed solidarity with workers through speeches, meetings, and street plays — activities traditionally associated with democratic protest movements.

The case of Satyam Verma was equally revealing. Verma, a journalist and editor associated with writings on Bhagat Singh and anti-colonial political history, was arrested from his residence in Lucknow. Friends and associates described him as a long-time journalist, translator, and intellectual engaged with labour and democratic issues rather than violent mobilisation. Other arrests followed a similar pattern.

Himanshu Thakur, a 24-year-old history postgraduate from Hansraj College and a NET-qualified scholar, was accused of instigating crowds and coordinating violence. His family described him as someone involved in student activism, translation work, and social causes, including protests relating to student deaths during the Delhi flooding crisis.

What became increasingly visible through these arrests was a larger pattern: The state was collapsing the distinction between labour organising, political solidarity, and criminal conspiracy.

This distinction mattered enormously. Instead of recognising collective labour mobilisation as a democratic response emerging from exploitation, inflation, contractual insecurity, and wage stagnation, authorities increasingly personalised the unrest through narratives centred on masterminds, infiltrators, and ideological actors.

This framing effectively erased workers’ own political agency. The implication was that workers themselves could not independently organise resistance after years of economic distress and labour exploitation. Their anger had to be explained through manipulation by “outsiders.” Historically, states confronting labour unrest have often relied upon precisely this strategy.

Worker mobilisation is reframed not as a consequence of material exploitation but as evidence of political contamination or organised subversion. The consequences of such a framework extend far beyond one protest. Once labour solidarity itself becomes suspicious, the democratic space available for workers to organise, negotiate, document abuses, and collectively assert rights begins shrinking dramatically. This was what made the Noida crackdown especially significant. The issue was no longer merely how the state handled one industrial protest.

The deeper question was whether independent labour mobilisation itself was increasingly being treated as illegitimate within India’s contemporary industrial order — particularly when it challenged industrial profitability, disrupted production, or exposed the inequalities hidden beneath the language of economic growth and “Make in India” industrial success.

Detailed report on state crackdown on dissent may be read here.

Noida was one of the most important labour protests in contemporary India

The importance of Noida cannot be overstated. The protests formed part of a broader wave of labour unrest across industrial regions including Manesar, Surat, Panipat, Barauni, Faridabad, and other manufacturing hubs.

Across sectors and geographies, workers raised remarkably similar demands:

• living wages,
• overtime compensation,
• social security,
• dignified working conditions,
• stable employment,
• humane working hours.

This convergence revealed a national labour crisis. Noida exposed the widening contradiction at the centre of India’s economic model: expanding industrial growth and rising productivity alongside deepening worker insecurity and stagnant real wages. Most importantly, the protests revealed the limits of governing labour through precarity, exhaustion, fear, and suppression.

The interim wage hikes announced after the unrest only reinforced this reality. The government responded meaningfully only after workers paralysed industrial movement and disrupted production. That fact alone is a profound indictment of the existing labour regime.

Noida was not merely an industrial disturbance. It was a warning from the workforce sustaining India’s manufacturing economy — a warning that an industrial system built on insecurity, wage suppression, informalisation, and coercion cannot indefinitely maintain social peace.

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The post Noida Protest 2026: A labour uprising the state refused to understand appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The team, formed by civil rights group Jan Hastakshep included Supreme Court senior advocate S.S. Nehra, former Hindu College professor Ish Mishra, retired IFS officer Ashok Sharma, senior journalist Anil Dubey, and senior advocate M.Z. Ali.

The team visited Noida on April 24 and spoke to workers across multiple industrial units, shopkeepers and other affected residents on the issue.

According to the statement released by the team, investigators have found no evidence to support allegations circulated by sections of the administration and media that foreign elements were behind the protests.

Instead, the team reported how, the anger among the workers had been building for years over low wages, rising inflation and comparisons with higher minimum wages in neighbouring Delhi and Haryana. The agitating workers told the team that factories relocating from Delhi and Gurugram to Noida continued paying lower wages after shifting operations, despite higher pay scales prevailing in those regions.

The fact-finding group said that this dissatisfaction intensified after workers learned that wages at units in Haryana –barely 170 kilometres away–had increased significantly following a hike in minimum wages there. This comparison, combined with stagnant wages in Noida for 10 years, reportedly triggered the initial sit-in protest at a garment-manufacturing unit in Sector 83 earlier this month. According to the Fact-finding team’s statement, protests spread across industrial clusters in Sectors 59, 60, 62, 83 and 84, eventually drawing tens of thousands of workers onto the streets. The team also alleged that police action escalated tensions and that more than 1,000 workers were detained, with some families not informed of their whereabouts for several days.

The team of investigators noted that the state government’s subsequent actions, including issuing notices to 43 contractors, cancelling licences of 10 contractors and announcing a 21 per cent wage increase, indicated acknowledgement of the irregularities in wage practices rather than evidence of any external conspiracy.

Significantly, a trade union leader who had worked in a multinational company, also told the team that two decades ago, wages were not an issue in NOIDA and Greater NOIDA because wages here were higher than in other states. However, conditions have changed over the past 20 years.

Disparate wages: While wages increased in Delhi and Haryana, they did not increase in Uttar Pradesh, and companies arbitrarily set their own minimum wages. This difference also significantly increased exploitation. He added that most of NOIDA industries operate with only contract labour, with companies hiring workers through contractors who provide no security or other benefits.

The team concluded that the unrest reflected long-standing labour grievances rooted in wage stagnation and rising living costs, and called for implementation of revised minimum wages, linking wages to inflation, and withdrawal of cases against workers involved in the protests.

Related:

NSA slapped on journalist, DU scholar in Noida workers’ protest case amid allegations of crackdown on dissent

The post No ‘Pakistan conspiracy’ in Noida labour unrest: Fact-finding report appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Long before the current anxieties around Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercises emerged, CJP had already been deeply involved in questions surrounding identity documentation, citizenship verification and exclusionary administrative processes. Our first intensive and continuing interventions are in the north-eastern state of Assam, where a peculiar blend of exclusivist xenophobic politics shaped policy and actions that have together targeted legitimate Indians in the quagmire of having ‘to establish documented citizenship.’ Read about CJP’d continuing journey through 2025 here.

Subsequently, two years down the line, 2019-2020, during the months and years of fear generated by the CAA-NRC debates, CJP organised extensive documentation and awareness campaigns across several states, helping communities understand legal processes, preserve records, obtain missing documents and resist panic-driven misinformation. The organisation’s interventions consistently focused on ensuring that vulnerable populations—especially minorities, migrants, women, Adivasis, Denotified Tribes (DNTs), informal workers and economically marginalised groups—were not pushed outside the constitutional framework through procedural barriers.

Detailed reports may be read here, here, here and here.

It is from this history of engagement that CJP, together with Vote for Democracy (VFD), began conducting a series of detailed SIR awareness and training sessions in Maharashtra. In 2025, with the elections to the Bihar State Assembly, the State’s most recent efforts to push large sections of Indians to potential disenfranchisement by exacting an unrealistic ‘citizenship test’ began. The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise that subsequently travelled to Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh has defied statutory law (Representation of People’s Act, 1951), Constitutional precedents (Article 14, 15 and 21) and the basic principles of due process and natural justice.

Tragically, this SIR exercise has been preceded by the most significant erosion of autonomy and integrity of a constitutional body like the Election Commission of India (ECI), casting a cloud on the very integrity of the election process under Articles 324-326 of the Indian Constitution. Vote for Democracy (VFD), a citizens’ platform guided by experts has analysed and exposed this deterioration of fair and free elections from the parliamentary elections of April-June 2024. VFD’s reports may be read here, here, here and here.

These trainings were never intended to legitimise or endorse a hurried and deeply problematic SIR exercise. In fact, the position adopted by CJP and VFD has remained unequivocal: the current SIR model, as implemented across multiple states, raises profound constitutional concerns because of the manner in which it transfers the burden of proof onto ordinary citizens while creating conditions ripe for exclusion and disenfranchisement. The purpose of the trainings, therefore, was not compliance for its own sake. It was protection.

As the CJP-VFD booklet on SIR itself clearly states, the trainings are meant “strictly to arm you with the tools to defend your rights and navigate this unconstitutional hurdle, not to legitimise it.”

The booklet may be read here and here.

At a time when fear, misinformation and confusion were spreading rapidly among communities, the trainings sought to communicate one essential message: panic helps exclusionary systems thrive. Knowledge, preparation and collective solidarity followed by determined interventions and action, are what protect democratic rights.

The Maharashtra trainings

Over the course of several months, CJP conducted three major SIR-focused training and awareness programmes in Maharashtra:

• March 21: Training session with Bombay Catholic Sabha
• April 16: Joint awareness and training session with a Community-Based Organisation (CBO), Agripada, South Mumbai
• April 30: Community training programme with Jan Haqq Sangharsh Samiti

These were not routine seminars or technical workshops. They became spaces where fear, uncertainty and lived experiences surfaced openly.

Participants included community organisers, women’s groups, migrant workers, social activists, minority organisations, students, religious leaders, local volunteers, housing rights advocates, DNT representatives, trade union workers, and ordinary residents increasingly worried about how SIR-style exercises could impact their ability to remain on electoral rolls.

Across all three programmes, a striking reality emerged repeatedly: for many people, the fear was not abstract. It was deeply personal. The idea that decades-old documents could suddenly determine one’s legitimacy as a voter –and thereafter a citizen– triggered anxieties rooted in poverty, displacement, migration, illiteracy, gender discrimination and bureaucratic neglect accumulated over generations.

In fact, for a joint delegation meeting with the CEO of Maharashtra, Chokkalingam in early March 2026, of which CJP was a crucial part, was revelatory. The officer unambiguously stated that the 2003 Guidelines would not be followed but also admitted that ‘no fresh guidelines had yet been issued’ by the ECI, Delhi. Emphasising that the current exercise would be one in determining that ‘only Indians’ figure on the electoral roll, Chokkalingam explained the amendments made to Section 3 of the Indian Citizenship Act, 1955 that distinguished between a) those born before 1987, b) those between 1987 (July 1) and 2004 and those c) those born after that date in terms of what sorts of documentary proof were required to ‘establish’ Indian citizenship. For a) simply being born in India was proof enough, for b) in addition to his/her own birth in India, it was required to establish that at least one of the parents was Indian; and for c) it was important to establish that neither mother nor father was an ‘illegal immigrant.’

The Bihar and West Bengal Experience: Why these trainings became necessary

The Maharashtra sessions were built directly upon the extensive field experiences documented by CJP and VFD teams in states where SIR-related exercises had already generated serious problems. These include Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu. Assam has, meanwhile only so far had a Special Revision (SR) of its rolls, not an SIR.

Ground reports from Bihar and West Bengal revealed patterns of confusion, mass anxiety, arbitrary notices, technological mismatches, documentation hurdles and administrative opacity. These findings eventually culminated in the publication of the detailed handbook Inside the Special Intensive Revision (SIR): Deadly Deadlines, Mechanical Disenfranchisement, and the Ground Reality of Claims and Objections Period & SIR Notices/Hearings.

The booklet combined investigative analysis, field documentation, legal guidance and practical training material. It explained the structure of the SIR process, the roles of electoral officers, the significance of legacy electoral rolls, the functioning of notices and hearings, appeal mechanisms, acceptable documents, and the methods through which exclusion was being operationalised on the ground.

Most importantly, it documented how the current SIR framework represented a dramatic departure from earlier electoral revision exercises.

The 2003 SIR process, for example, had been conducted over nearly six months, relied on existing electoral rolls and EPIC cards as foundational documents, and emphasised facilitative house-to-house verification. Enumerators were not expected to function as citizenship adjudicators. This time round, 2025-2026, with the ECI acting like the weaponised (read unconstitutional) arm of an exclusivist regime, hurried and arbitrary adjudications on citizenship have become the order of the day.

The present model, therefore, has increasingly transformed electoral verification into an exercise marked by compressed timelines, mechanical scrutiny, opaque software systems, and retrospective documentary burdens. CJP and VFD’s field reports documented how software-driven mismatches involving spelling variations, transliteration differences, age-gap calculations and data-entry inconsistencies generated large numbers of “unmatched” or “suspicious” entries.

The Maharashtra trainings therefore emerged not from speculation, but from documented experiences already unfolding elsewhere.

What happens when the poor are asked to prove their existence?

A significant portion of the Maharashtra trainings conducted by CJP focused on helping participants understand the broad range of documents that may potentially be relied upon during SIR-related verification processes. Methods of accessing documents that may exist and be available with local authorities, understanding and tracking legacy and linkages to those voters/citizens who are available and verifiable in the baseline document –the electoral role between 2002-2004—were also granularly shared. CJP’s experiences pan-India across states and regions, intervening on multiple fronts has created a rich knowledge base of accessing documents from levels of the bureaucracy and this is being widely shared. The trainings repeatedly stressed an important point: people often panic because they assume that the absence of one “perfect” document automatically disqualifies them. However, the indicative list itself demonstrates that identity and eligibility can be established through multiple forms of documentary evidence.

Participants were carefully guided through the list of acceptable or supporting documents referenced in the handbook and subsequent judicial interventions. These include: identity cards or pension payment orders issued to government employees or pensioners; identity cards or certificates issued by government authorities, banks, post offices, LIC or PSUs prior to July 1, 1987; birth certificates; passports; matriculation or educational certificates; permanent residence certificates; forest rights certificates; OBC, SC or ST caste certificates; NRC records where available; family registers prepared by state or local authorities; land or house allotment certificates; Aadhaar cards; and Class 10 admit cards or pass certificates.

Throughout the trainings, facilitators repeatedly emphasised that even one among these documents, when supported with supplementary records and consistent identity details, could help establish a person’s identity and continued existence within the social and administrative framework of the country. The sessions therefore focused heavily on practical strategies: how to organise documents chronologically, how to retrieve old records, how to preserve photocopies and acknowledgements, and how to identify alternative supporting papers where primary documents were unavailable.

Yet, as the discussions during the trainings revealed, the ground reality surrounding documentation is far more complicated than official lists often assume. For large sections of the population, documents are not simply lying safely preserved in family cupboards waiting to be produced before authorities. Instead, documentation histories are fragmented by poverty, migration, environmental disasters, displacement, gender discrimination and bureaucratic neglect accumulated over decades. Many participants explained that births in their communities took place at home and were never formally registered. Others spoke of losing papers during drought-induced migration, floods, demolitions, fires or repeated changes in residence. Several older participants described how schools they attended no longer exist, making retrieval of school leaving certificates or mark sheets almost impossible today.

Women repeatedly raised concerns about documentary inconsistencies arising from early (pre 18 or 21 years) marriage-related surname changes, spelling variations and shifts in residence. Some women who were married young explained that they had voted for the first time from their husband’s homes, bypassing any formal electoral linkage with their natal families. This now makes tracing documentary continuity with parental records extremely difficult though not impossible.

Similarly, members of Denotified and Nomadic Tribes (DNTs), migrant workers and daily wage earners pointed out that even obtaining caste certificates, residence proofs or duplicate records often requires multiple visits to government offices—something many cannot afford without losing crucial daily income. For homeless persons, tenants, informal workers and highly mobile populations, stable address-based documentation itself becomes a challenge.

The trainings therefore highlighted a critical contradiction at the heart of documentation-heavy verification exercises: while the State increasingly demands layered documentary proof, millions of people have historically lived at the margins of formal documentation systems themselves. In this context, the sessions sought not only to explain which documents may help, but also to collectively confront the deeper structural inequalities that determine who is able to preserve paperwork, who is visible within administrative systems, and who remains vulnerable to exclusion.

Documents Decide Everything: The fear communities brought into the trainings

One of the most powerful aspects of the Maharashtra sessions was the extent to which people spoke openly about the fragility of their documentary histories. Again and again, participants raised concerns that exposed the enormous disconnect between bureaucratic expectations and lived realities.

The missing birth certificate problem: Perhaps the most recurring concern involved birth certificates.

Large sections of older generations, particularly from rural, working-class and poor communities, were born at home and never formally registered with civil authorities. Institutional births were inaccessible, expensive or culturally uncommon for decades. Women participants repeatedly spoke about how neither they nor their siblings had any birth records because births took place with the assistance of local midwives rather than within hospitals.

The statistics themselves reveal why this remains such a massive issue. Birth registration in India became widespread only relatively recently. Even official data shows significant historical gaps in registration coverage.

For many participants, the sudden expectation that decades-old birth records must now exist produced profound anxiety.

Maharashtra’s histories of drought, migration and loss: Participants also described how environmental and economic crises had repeatedly destroyed family records.

Several communities had lived through devastating droughts across parts of Maharashtra, forcing migration, distress movement and repeated displacement. Others recalled losing documents during floods, cyclones, fires or long-term housing instability. Some participants referred to records lost during the tsunami years or during forced relocations connected to urban redevelopment and informal settlement demolitions. For poor families surviving through cycles of migration and precarious labour, preserving fragile paper records over decades was often impossible.

Yet the current SIR-style expectations assume stable homes, continuous paperwork, formal institutional access and uninterrupted documentation histories.

When the school itself no longer exists: Another major issue that surfaced repeatedly was the problem of accessing school records. Many older government schools, village schools and informal educational institutions no longer exist in their original form. Buildings were demolished, records disappeared, administrations changed, or archives were never digitised.

Several participants explained that even when they knew they had once studied in a particular school, obtaining school leaving certificates or mark sheets today had become practically impossible because the institution itself had shut down or records were destroyed years ago.

For individuals from poor families who studied intermittently or dropped out early to begin work, educational documentation is often fragmentary or inaccessible. Yet these very records are increasingly treated as crucial identity markers.

The invisible burden on Denotified tribes and marginalised communities: The trainings also foregrounded concerns specific to Denotified and Nomadic Tribes (DNTs), whose histories of exclusion from stable settlement patterns, education systems and formal state recognition continue to shape their present vulnerabilities.

Participants pointed out that many DNT communities remain structurally under-documented because generations lived outside formal administrative frameworks. Accessing caste certificates, residence records or historical proofs often requires repeated interactions with distant bureaucratic offices.

For daily wage earners, every visit to a government office means losing a day’s income. The trainings repeatedly emphasised that documentation burdens are never socially neutral. They fall most heavily on those already living precariously.

Women and documentary disruption: Women’s experiences emerged as one of the most significant dimensions of the discussions. Across communities and religions, women described how marriage routinely disrupted documentary continuity. Changes in surname after marriage frequently resulted in inconsistencies across different identity documents.

Many older women explained that they had married before turning 18 and had voted for the first time from their husband’s residence rather than from their natal home. This makes establishing documentary linkage with parental records extraordinarily difficult decades later.

Minor spelling variations across ration cards, Aadhaar cards, voter IDs, educational certificates and marriage-related records further complicate verification. The Maharashtra trainings paid particular attention to these gendered documentary realities because women are often expected to “prove” continuity across names, addresses and households shaped by patriarchal social structures.

Electoral revision cannot become citizenship surveillance

Throughout the sessions, CJP and VFD repeatedly stressed a crucial constitutional principle: electoral revision cannot be converted into a mechanism of suspicion against already-enfranchised citizens.

The handbook itself notes that the present SIR framework reverses long-standing democratic presumptions by effectively treating registered voters as suspect unless they can repeatedly prove their eligibility through documentary evidence.

This is particularly alarming because millions of people currently on electoral rolls have already voted in multiple elections over decades.

The trainings therefore focused heavily on rights awareness:

• understanding notices,
• organising documents,
• preserving acknowledgements,
• seeking written orders,
• attending hearings with support persons,
• filing appeals,
• resisting arbitrary deletions,
• and documenting procedural violations.

Participants were also trained on how to search older electoral rolls, including the 2002–2004 rolls increasingly treated as “legacy data” within SIR processes. The sessions explained the functioning of Booth Level Officers (BLOs), Electoral Registration Officers (EROs), Assistant Electoral Registration Officers (AEROs), appeal processes, and the importance of procedural safeguards.

Rights groups and CBO’s were trained on and encouraged to, by the CJP team, to organise collectively and voice concerns with the offices of the state election commission so that specific concerns and anxieties of the varieties of stake holders—genuine voters, be they migrants from other states, women, minorities, DNTs, displaced persons—could be readily addressed by an otherwise opaque SEC.

CJP’s memorandum to the Maharashtra CEO

Parallel to these trainings, CJP and VFD formally approached the Maharashtra State Election Commission and the Chief Electoral Officer of Maharashtra with a detailed memorandum raising concerns about possible disenfranchisement and procedural opacity.

The memorandum urged authorities to ensure:

• accessible and searchable electoral rolls,
• properly trained personnel,
• multilingual assistance systems,
• protection against algorithmic exclusion,
• public transparency,
• a publicised social audit of the draft revised polls and the final ones (this has been mentioned as a mandatory and healthy requirement in the ECI’s own 2023 Handbook of Guidelines on Electoral Rolls;
• and safeguards against arbitrary deletions.

Importantly, the memorandum emphasised that electoral revision must reduce fear rather than produce it. It warned that when documentation burdens are imposed without adequate support structures, the people who suffer first are always those already pushed to the margins: minorities, migrants, tenants, women, informal workers, DNTs and economically vulnerable populations.

Beyond Documentation: Building collective confidence

What distinguished these Maharashtra trainings was that they did not treat documentation as merely technical paperwork. They recognised documentation as deeply tied to dignity, memory, class, caste, migration, gender and survival.

For many participants, the sessions became spaces where people realised they were not individually “failing” because documents were missing or inconsistent. Rather, their experiences reflected structural realities shared by millions across India.

The trainings therefore consistently emphasised solidarity and collective defence:

• helping elderly persons retrieve records,
• assisting women facing name mismatches,
• supporting migrant workers unable to attend hearings,
• guiding daily wage earners through documentation processes,
• and ensuring that vulnerable communities do not face bureaucratic intimidation alone.

At a time when administrative processes increasingly risk producing fear and invisibility, these sessions attempted to restore confidence in constitutional rights and democratic participation.

A democratic intervention against fear

Ultimately, the SIR trainings conducted by CJP across Maharashtra were not merely legal awareness programmes. They were democratic interventions against fear.

They sought to remind people that the right to vote is not a favour granted conditionally by shifting bureaucratic systems. It is a constitutional guarantee rooted in the promise of universal adult franchise. They also sought to expose a harsh reality: when democratic participation becomes dependent upon perfect documentation histories stretching across decades, exclusion ceases to be accidental. It becomes structural.

For precisely this reason, the trainings insisted that preparation—not panic—must guide public response. Because behind every “missing document,” “mismatched name,” or “unavailable legacy record” is not simply a paperwork problem, but a human history shaped by poverty, migration, patriarchy, displacement, disaster and institutional neglect.

And it is these histories that CJP’s Maharashtra trainings sought to bring into the centre of the conversation—so that democracy is not reduced to an exercise in mechanical verification, but remains anchored in constitutional inclusion, human dignity and collective rights.

Related:

Inside the SIR: A voter roll exercise turning into a test of survival

Demystifying the SIR Notice: A systemic hurdle, not a final verdict

CJP Assam: A journey without parallel, evolving & expanding rights jurisprudence

The post Documents Cannot Decide Democracy: How CJP is training communities to navigate the SIR process appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Chief Minster (CM), Himanta Biswa Sarma made the announcement while addressing the media after the first Cabinet meeting in his second term holding the post. Sarma took oath as Chief Minister for the second consecutive term on May 12, 2026. Results of the elections came in on May 4.

At his press meet Himanta Said the decision was taken to present the UCC in the House on the last day of the present session of the Assam Assembly on May 26. The Assam Cabinet approved the draft UCC on the May 13 and he said that we will present the UCC in the House on the last day of the first Assembly session as soon as the members take oath.

Explaining the intended law, he said the UCC will exclude tribal booth Hills and plains people from the scope of the UCC and clarified that said the UCC will not affect any religious customs. Specifically, the proposed UCC will focus on a total of four issues,” he added, “These include the minimum age of marriage, Polygamy, the rights of women in property and live in relationships.”

He added that if someone asks whether the UCC requires worship or prayers, how to hold a Chaklong wedding, etc., there should be no such questions, which is why the UCC is not concerned with religious observances or religious traditions. “The government has no say in how worship has to be done or prayers have to be offered.

He may be heard https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1891XEALmG/

A special session of the Assam Assembly is scheduled to be held from May 21–26, 2026. Newly elected MLAs will take oath during the session. The proposed bill that was approved in the Cabinet Minister’s meeting on May 12 will be tabled on May 26, the concluding day of the session.

According to the brief by Sarma, the proposed legislation aims to address:

i) Legal age of marriage

ii) Polygamy

iii) Inheritance rights

iv) Live-in relationships

v) Compulsory registration of marriage and divorce

With this move, Assam will become the third state after Uttarakhand and Gujarat to table a UCC Bill. All three are states ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

It is noteworthy—and can certainly be asserted—that this decision, taken during the very first cabinet meeting of the BJP’s third government in Assam (and Himanta’s 2.0 administration), was specifically aimed at targeting a particular community.

On a previous occasion as well, the Himanta government had raised issues such as “Love Jihad” in the Legislative Assembly, specifically targeting the Muslim community.

Meanwhile, Himanta Biswa Sarma has previously stated that banning polygamy and “deceitful religious conversions” is part of Assam’s move toward a UCC-like framework. This echoes recommendations of the Justice (Retd.) Rumi Kumari Phukan Committee, which examined the legal viability of such a measure.

Related:

Assam Government to table ‘Love Jihad’ and polygamy bills, CM Sarma says parents of male accused will also face arrest

The post Assam: Bill on Uniform Civil Code (UCC), a partisan act? appeared first on SabrangIndia.

According to the police statement, both Verma and Choudhary were allegedly associated with “Mazdoor Bigul Dasta” and had played a “significant role” in the violence, arson and disruption that accompanied the workers’ protest. Police further claimed that the two attempted to disturb public order by “provoking” workers in different areas and circulating inflammatory material. Senior police officers, quoted in report by The Times of India, cited CCTV footage, electronic evidence, intelligence inputs and social media activity as the basis for invoking the NSA, a preventive detention law that permits incarceration for up to one year without trial on grounds related to national security or maintenance of public order.

The use of the NSA against the two has, however, triggered strong criticism from lawyers, labour rights groups, civil liberties organisations and campaigners associated with the Campaign for the Release of Workers and Activists of Noida (CaRWAN), who have termed the move an attempt to indefinitely prolong incarceration after the prosecution allegedly failed to establish concrete evidence during bail proceedings. Supreme Court advocate Ali Zia Kabir Choudhary, representing several accused in the matter, told The Wire that neither the accused nor their legal teams had been formally provided documents explaining the grounds on which the NSA was invoked. He pointed out that under constitutional safeguards, including Article 22 concerning protection against arrest and detention; the arrested persons are entitled to be informed of the grounds of detention.

“The only detail we have is the police press release. No papers have been supplied. In court we argued that there is not a single piece of evidence showing that Satyam or others called for violence,” Choudhary said while speaking to The Wire, adding that in Verma’s case, police had allegedly failed to show that he was even part of any WhatsApp groups cited during arguments. He further alleged that the prosecution relied largely on unrelated photographs and chats involving persons who were not arrested.

Timing of NSA invocation raises concerns

CaRWAN, in a statement issued on May 13 and cited by The Wire, questioned the timing of the NSA charges, noting that the law was invoked only after the prosecution faced difficulty during bail hearings. The collective stated that during the hearing, defence counsel highlighted the “emptiness of the charges” and the “illegality of the arrests,” while prosecutors allegedly failed to present substantial incriminating material against either Verma or Choudhary. The group argued that the accused had already spent over a month in judicial custody and that the sudden invocation of the NSA appeared designed solely to ensure continued detention.

The police crackdown follows weeks of unrest linked to industrial workers’ protests in Noida and Greater Noida. As reported by Hindustan Times, the demonstrations began on April 10 after the Haryana government announced a substantial increase in minimum wages for workers, prompting labourers in Noida’s industrial belt to demand similar hikes, better overtime compensation and improved working conditions. While protests remained largely peaceful in the initial days, violence broke out on April 13 across several industrial sectors, during which factories were allegedly vandalised, vehicles torched and police personnel injured in incidents of stone pelting.

Following the violence, the Uttar Pradesh Police launched a sweeping crackdown. Multiple FIRs, various reports place the number between seven and fifteen, were registered across police stations including Phase II and Sector 63. According to The Indian Express, hundreds of people were detained in the aftermath, while at least 60 individuals remain incarcerated on charges ranging from rioting and criminal conspiracy to attempt to murder. Police have consistently maintained, including in statements carried by The Hindu and Hindustan Times, that the violence was not spontaneous but orchestrated by an “organised syndicate of outsiders.”

Activists, students and scholars among those arrested

The arrests have drawn particular attention because many of those booked are students, researchers, labour organisers and activists rather than industrial workers themselves.

Satyam Verma, a 60-year-old journalist based in Lucknow, was arrested on April 17. According to The Indian Express, Verma previously worked with the news agency Univarta and has been associated with Janchetna Books and Jagaruk Nagrik Manch. He has also written for the labour publication Mazdoor Bigul, after which the organisation “Mazdoor Bigul Dasta” is allegedly named. Friends and supporters quoted in The Indian Express described him as a writer, translator and editor deeply engaged with labour rights and progressive literature. He is also the son of noted historian and academic Lal Bahadur Verma.

Civil rights groups have strongly disputed police claims portraying Verma as a “main conspirator.” CaRWAN stated in comments carried by The Times of India and The Wire that Verma was not present in Noida during the protests and had reportedly not visited the city in over a decade. His associates argue that the prosecution has attempted to criminalise ideological affiliations rather than establish any direct role in violence.

Aakriti Choudhary, 25, a postgraduate in history from Delhi University’s Daulat Ram College and an aspiring PhD scholar, was detained by plainclothes officers at Noida’s Botanical Garden Metro Station on April 11 — two days before the violence erupted. The Hindu reported that police initially claimed she was detained for disturbing public order, but later alleged that subsequent investigation uncovered evidence linking her to organising the protests.

Her father, Arun Choudhary, associated with the CPI(M) mouthpiece Ganashakti, questioned in comments to The Indian Express how someone detained before April 13 could be charged with orchestrating violence that occurred later. He defended his daughter’s participation in labour solidarity campaigns and criticised attempts to equate Left political beliefs with criminality. Defence lawyers similarly noted, according to Hindustan Times, that during proceedings prosecutors allegedly presented a book recovered from her residence as evidence of “Left-wing ideology.”

Concerns over criminalisation of ideology and dissent

It has been argued that the prosecution’s case increasingly appears to rely on political profiling rather than direct evidence of criminal conduct. Rajnish Yadav, counsel for Choudhary and other accused, told The Indian Express that the activists had merely participated in solidarity efforts, including speeches and street plays supporting workers demanding fair wages. He compared their participation to broader solidarity movements seen during the farmers’ protests.

The police have also arrested several other young activists and students. Among them is Aditya Anand, a 28-year-old NIT Jamshedpur graduate employed at Genpact, arrested from Tiruchirappalli on April 18. According to The Indian Express, police allege he delivered “provocative” speeches and organised marches during the protests. His family, however, portrayed him as a socially conscious engineer deeply engaged in labour rights issues and associated with the Naujawan Bharat Sabha.

Another accused, Himanshu Thakur, a 24-year-old history postgraduate from Hansraj College and a NET-qualified PhD aspirant, was arrested from Delhi’s Shalimar Bagh on allegations of coordinating protests and instigating crowds. His family told The Indian Express that he was the sole earning member of the household who supplemented family income through freelance translation work while advocating for students’ and women’s rights.

Families of working-class accused have also described devastating economic consequences following the arrests. The Indian Express reported that Amit Kumar, a 19-year-old worker from Prayagraj earning ₹8,000 a month in Noida, and Pankaj Kumar, a mason from New Ashok Nagar, are among those whose detention has reportedly pushed already vulnerable families into debt and unemployment.

Questions over misuse of the NSA

The use of the NSA in Uttar Pradesh has long been controversial. In April 2021, an investigation by The Indian Express reported that the Allahabad High Court had raised concerns over the apparent misuse of the law after red-flagging 94 out of 120 habeas corpus petitions involving NSA detentions. Similarly, Newslaundry reported in 2022 that police proposals seeking NSA sanctions in communal violence cases had invoked conspiracy narratives such as “land jihad.”

It must be pointed out that the NSA, unlike ordinary criminal law, allows preventive detention through executive orders without the procedural protections of a regular criminal trial. Human rights advocates have repeatedly warned that the law is frequently deployed to circumvent bail and prolong incarceration where ordinary criminal charges may not withstand judicial scrutiny. The invocation of the NSA in the Noida workers’ protest case has therefore intensified concerns regarding the shrinking space for labour organising, student activism and political dissent.

Related:

JNU Students Lathi-charged, Injured, first detained during protest over V-C remarks, UGC Equity guidelines, now Jailed

UGC Guidelines 2026: AISA Protest at Delhi University followed by sexual abuse allegations amid police presence

When Protest becomes a “Threat”: Inside the Supreme Court hearing on Sonam Wangchuk’s NSA detention

Solidarity with protests of locals against projects facilitating coal transportation (Goa to Karnataka): NAPM

‘We Were Promised Rehabilitation’: Gurugram’s oldest Dalit settlement bulldozed after decade long battle; police violently beat and detain residents for protesting

The post NSA slapped on journalist, DU scholar in Noida workers’ protest case amid allegations of crackdown on dissent appeared first on SabrangIndia.

According to Kolkata Police Commissioner Ajay Kumar Nand, the arrest followed a complaint lodged by the District Election Officer (DEO) of Kolkata North. Police stated that Chatterjee had been summoned twice during the inquiry but allegedly failed to appear before investigators, prompting the cyber cell to proceed with his arrest.

“The complaint against him was lodged by the District Election Officer of Kolkata North, following which the cyber cell initiated action. He was summoned twice in connection with the matter, but he did not appear, and that is the reason why he was arrested,” Commissioner Nand told reporters at Lalbazar police headquarters, as quoted by The Hindu.

Police officials said Chatterjee would be produced before a court on Wednesday.

Posts on EVMs and Election Commission under scanner

Investigators allege that Chatterjee circulated misleading claims regarding EVM functioning and attempted to create distrust around the electoral process through social media posts made during polling and counting phases of the election, according to The Indian Express.

Officials told The Indian Express that on April 23, during the first phase of polling, Chatterjee publicly questioned why certain EVMs reportedly malfunctioned in the morning despite undergoing checks the previous night. In another social media post on May 4, the day votes were counted, he allegedly accused the Election Commission of India of carrying out a “secret plan” during the counting process.

Police have described these statements as attempts to spread confusion and misinformation surrounding the conduct of elections and the functioning of EVMs, according to The Telegraph.

Chatterjee had also advised voters through social media posts to verify VVPAT slips carefully before leaving polling booths after casting their votes, The Indian Express reported.

Academic-turned-activist and Bengali identity politics

A Harvard-educated neuroscientist and faculty member at the Indian Statistical Institute, Chatterjee became widely known in recent years for his political activism centred on Bengali linguistic and cultural identity, as noted by The Indian Express.

Founded in 2017, Bangla Pokkho has consistently campaigned for prioritising Bengali language, culture and employment opportunities for local youth in West Bengal. The organisation has also opposed what it describes as the “imposition” of Hindi in the State, according to The Hindu.

During the 2026 Assembly elections, Chatterjee had publicly urged voters to support either the All India Trinamool Congress or Left Front candidates while opposing the Bharatiya Janata Party, which he characterised as a party of “outsiders”, The Hindu reported.

CLEAR calls arrest an “assault on democratic dissent”

In the wake of the arrest, the Campaign for Language Equality and Rights (CLEAR), a civil society platform advocating linguistic equality and mother tongue rights, issued a strongly worded statement condemning the police action and demanding the immediate and unconditional release of Garga Chatterjee. Describing Chatterjee as a “neuroscientist, cultural activist” and one of CLEAR’s founding members, the organisation argued that the arrest amounted to “a direct assault on freedom of speech, democratic dissent, and the constitutional rights of every citizen.”

Invoking Articles 19(1)(a) and 21 of the Constitution, CLEAR cited recent observations of the Supreme Court of India affirming the right of citizens to criticise state institutions and peacefully dissent against government decisions. The statement further argued that public scrutiny of EVMs and the electoral process had repeatedly been recognised as legitimate within constitutional democracy, including in cases such as Subramanian Swamy v. Election Commission of India and Association for Democratic Reforms v. Election Commission of India. “Questioning EVMs is not sedition. It is democracy,” the statement said.

CLEAR also expressed concern over the fact that the complaint against Chatterjee had reportedly originated from the Election Commission of India itself, arguing that this raised “serious concerns regarding conflict of interest and the use of state machinery to silence criticism.” The organisation further alleged that no specific social media posts had been publicly identified as forming the basis of the FIR, calling the arrest “arbitrary, disproportionate, and contrary to the principles of natural justice.” Alongside demanding withdrawal of the complaint and transparency regarding the FIR, CLEAR called upon civil society groups and democratic organisations across the country to stand in solidarity with Chatterjee.

Political parties liberation demands release

Reacting to the arrest, Dipankar Bhattacharya, general secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Liberation, criticised the police action and demanded Chatterjee’s immediate release.

According to The Indian Express, Bhattacharya described Chatterjee as a “well-known campaigner for Bengali identity and electoral transparency” and objected to the arrest over posts concerning alleged EVM tampering.

Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra took to social media to show her support.

I may not be a fan of Garga Chatterjee but arresting him & taking down his @GargaC X handle shows just how paranoid the new BJP Bengal government is. Banglar Bipokhhe Bangla Birodhi is the true face of this Parivartan. Make no mistake.

— Mahua Moitra (@MahuaMoitra) May 12, 2026

Previous arrests and controversies

This is not the first time Chatterjee has faced criminal proceedings over controversial remarks. In 2022, he was arrested following multiple FIRs filed in Assam accusing him of hurting Assamese sentiments and promoting enmity between communities after he allegedly referred to Sukaphaa, founder of the Ahom dynasty, as a “Chinese invader”, according to The Telegraph.

The controversy led to intervention by the Gauhati High Court, which issued directions concerning the execution of a non-bailable warrant against him. He was later granted transit bail subject to appearing before a court in Guwahati, as reported by The Telegraph. Separately, Bangla Pokkho members had also come under scrutiny in 2024 after two students from Bihar appearing for a Staff Selection Commission examination in Siliguri were allegedly assaulted. The Indian Express reported that a person linked to the organisation was detained in connection with the incident.

Related:

Bengal after the Ballot: Fear, retaliation and the politics of territorial power

As lynchings “normalise” in ‘New India, a Bihar imam is ‘thrashed, pushed’ from train to die in Bareilly

From FIRs to “Corporate Jihad”: How the TCS Nashik case was transformed from an investigation into a communal narrative

Fractured Fault lines: Violence, governance gaps, and rising tensions across Odisha

Censorship and the Drumbeats of Hate: Mapping the state of free speech ahead of the 2026 polls

The post ‘Bangla Pokkho’ founder Garga Chatterjee arrested over alleged EVM misinformation ahead of Bengal polls appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The opening paras of the article says it all, “It was waiting to happen. Only the “when” was not clear. The buildings in the industrial areas of the National Capital Region (NCR), with their glitzy interiors, could not camouflage the simmering anger of workers inside any longer. When what started as a small bubble of frustration took on the force of a volcanic eruption, fuelled by the oppressive conditions imposed by hostile employers and abetted by compliant governments, nothing could put a lid on it…Thus, in mid-April, workers poured out of their factories, striking work in the industrial area of the New Okhla Industrial Development Authority (Noida) in Uttar Pradesh, fully conscious of the reprisals and the heavy hand of the state that would come into play as the official reaction to their action. But it was a moment that the workers truly owned, and there was no factory that was unaffected…. There was no coordinated action, no direct union involvement. Yet, it seemed like magic. As per some official reports, workers across 82 factories struck work protesting against the 12-hour, 7-day working week and the harsh and unsafe working conditions within the factories, all for a measly monthly wage of Rs. 11,000 to Rs. 12,000.”

On November 21, 2025, the Government began implementing the four Labour Codes (on Wages, Industrial Relations, Social Security, and Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions). Concerned citizens, trade unions and opposition parties label them ‘anti-worker.’ Most regard these codes as favouring the corporate sector. Their ‘anti-worker’ dimensions include ‘the hire and fire policy’; ‘curtailing right to strike’; ‘expansion of Fixed-Term Employment (FTE); ‘diluted safety & welfare’

The way the NOIDA workers came out in droves to protest their grim reality is a case in point! The Uttar Pradesh government announced a 21% wage hike, but many workers and unions deemed this insufficient. The police have taken legal action against those (apparently several thousands) involved in the violence. On expected lines, the godified media did not highlight the plight and the protest of the NOIDA workers. The situation of the ordinary worker (particularly casual labourers and migrant workers) in India leaves much to be desired: most of them are at the mercy of employers who are exploitative and corrupt. Workers are often denied just wages and have long hours of work. Many do not get appointment letters nor are there the mandatory ‘Service Conditions.’ Trade Unions in India have become almost non-existent. The COVID period revealed the miserable conditions of the working class.

The month of May begins with the ‘International Workers’ Day’. This Day normally focuses on honouring the global workforce, promoting labour rights, and fighting exploitation. The Catholic Church has consistently championed the cause and the rights of workers. On 15 May 1891, Pope Leo XIII gave the world his path-breaking encyclical, ‘Rerum Novarum’ (‘Of New Things’), regarded as the foundational document of modern Catholic Social Teaching. The encyclical addressed the plight of the working class during the Industrial Revolution. It advocates for worker dignity, the right to form unions, and a just wage, while defending private property and rejecting both socialism and unrestrained capitalism.

In his Encyclical ‘Laborem Exercens’ (On human work), dtd. 14 September 1981, Pope John Paul writes, “the Church considers it her task always to call attention to the dignity and rights of those who work, to condemn situations in which that dignity and those rights are violated, and to help to guide [social] changes so as to ensure authentic progress by man and society.” Later, on 1 May 1991, he promulgated another Encyclical ‘Centesimus Annus’ (‘The Hundredth Year’) to commemorate the historic anniversary of ‘Rerum Novarum’. It reiterated the fundamental vision, of ‘Rerum Novarum’ and   expounded issues of social and economic justice, including a defense of private property rights and the right to form private associations, including labour unions

In keeping with the significance of the day, the Catholic Church celebrates it as the Feast of St. Joseph the Worker. Pope Pius XII established it in 1955, to honour Joseph as the patron of workers and to celebrate the dignity of human labour.

A year ago, on May 8, 2025, Pope Leo XIV was elected to succeed Pope Francis; he assumed office on 18 May. When asked to explain his choice of name, Pope Leo said, “I chose to take the name Leo XIV. There are different reasons for this, but mainly because Pope Leo XIII in his historic Encyclical ‘Rerum Novarum’ addressed the social question in the context of the first great industrial revolution. In our own day, the Church offers to everyone the treasury of her social teaching in response to another industrial revolution and to developments in the field of artificial intelligence that pose new challenges for the defence of human dignity, justice and labour.”

The Catholic Church has been consistent in defending the rights of workers for a more dignified, just and humane life. Cardinal Joseph Cardijn (1882-1967),  founder of the Young Christian Workers , left no stone unturned to focus on the plight of workers and ensure that the teachings of ‘Rerum Novarum’ are mainstreamed in the life and mission of the Church.

Pope Leo XIII says it very strongly in his ‘Rerum Novarum’, “(We must) save unfortunate working people from the cruelty of men of greed, who use human beings as mere instruments for money-making. It is neither just nor human to grind men down with excessive labour.”

The point is:  is anyone listening? Workers must unite! We must heed their cry for justice! We are all called to be in solidarity with workers, to ensure that they have better working conditions, with just wages, normal working hours and above all, to live in dignity!

 April 30, 2026

(The author is a human rights, reconciliation and peace activist)

Related:

India’s New Labour Codes: A critical appraisal

Lockdown has reduced lives of bidi labourers to ashes!

Bandna Parab: A festival that celebrates light and life

Will the 125-year old Bolpur Poush Mela be held this year?

The post Workers Cry for Justice! appeared first on SabrangIndia.

These demands have surfaced following concerns “regarding rights violations of this community

 In the context of the Amrabad Tiger Reserve, in Nagarkurnool district of Telangana; both the Adivasis and activists-in-solidarity have strongly asserted the legal and democratic rights of the Chenchu community in the Nallamalla forests. 

According to a press note issued by a solidarity forum, a series of actions last week – including 

1. The letters sent to various Central and state authorities and meetings with senior state officials, 
2. The Hyderabad civil society round table, on April 17, in which a large number of Chenchu Adivasis spoke resolutely against involuntary relocation and 
3. In the Prajavani meeting with Mr. Chinna Reddy, (Vice-Chairman of State Planning Board), where Chenchu adivasis were assured that their rights would be safeguarded and district forest officials were asked to comply with law. 

Some of the key demands in all these meetings and representations include 

1. An immediate end to issuing cheques and forcible relocation, in violation of law, 
2. Pursuing the harmonious co-existence model in Amrabad Tiger Reserve and ensuring the democratic participation of communities in forest governance 
3. Withdrawal of fabricated cases against Chenchu Adivasi leaders and 
4. Full compliance with all the relevant laws including the Forest Rights Act, 2006; especially community forest rights and habitat rights of Chenchus, Wildlife Protection Act, 1972 (as amended in 2006), Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996 and the Land Acquisition and Rehabilitation Act, 2013. 

As is well known, Chenchus are a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG) residing in the Nallamalla forests of Telangana, since generations. They are recorded as one of the ancient food gathering communities with rich traditional knowledge of forest produce, medicinal plants and live in close association with nature. As also recommended by Sir Christoph Von Haimendorf in 1940, their cultural significance with Nallamala forest should be rightly recognized, by declaring the region as a ‘Chenchu Conservation Bio-Reserve’, in order to protect their socio-cultural rights and their natural habitats. 

However, states the press release, the introduction of ‘Project Tiger’, has resulted in persistent efforts to forcibly relocate them from their natural habitats. The latest threat to their co-existence in the forest has been by way of cheques being issued in March 2026, by senior ministers of the state government, as part of Amrabad Tiger Reserve ‘Relocation package’. It is a gross injustice that without appropriate consultation and consent, as mandated by law, the Chenchu Adivasis are sought to be removed and relocated outside the Schedule-V Area, where they would have no access to wild foods or forest produce and where they will lose all their Scheduled Area constitutional safeguards. 

In this context, many Chenchu community members from affected villages of Sarlapally, Vatwarlapally, Kollampenta, Rayuletupenta, Uppununtala, Kudichintalabayalu came to Hyderabad on April 17, 2026 to submit petitions to the Chief Minister, through the Prajavani Grievance Cell, against the involuntary relocation and excesses of the Forest Department. They also shared their struggles and perspectives with many civil society and citizens groups, during a well-attended round table consultation on the same day. The youth and women gave very clear and cogent reasons as to why they do not want to leave their forest and how there was no proper consent or consultation with their Gram Sabhas. As Chiguru Nagamma of Kommanipenta said, “We have seen how our forefathers were displaced for other projects and whatever money came was wasted on liquor, so we do not want any money or land somewhere else. We will survive in the forest that has sustained us”. 

For example:

Tirupathaiah of Sarlapally gave examples of how basic development activities are not being allowed in their villages and how even the banks or government departments are refusing to give them loans or benefits of schemes because they are under ‘relocation’. Mallikarjun, the ex-Sarpanch, spoke about how their forest rights under the RoFR Act are pending and that shifting them outside the Scheduled Area would make them lose all their constitutional entitlements under PESA, FRA, LARR and LTR Acts. Guravaiah stated that he filed several detailed RTIs and appeals seeking information about the relocation details, but did not receive proper responses. 

The youth expressed their anguish that they are being criminalised with false cases for speaking out for their rights. They said that, along with state officials, some ‘pro-conservation groups’ are also creating a false narrative of ‘voluntary relocation’. They claimed that most of the people whose consent was taken so far, are not Adivasis and they are non-local people, who want to benefit from the package. The Chenchu women said that their men are being given petty jobs (such as forest watchers) to put pressure on their families for giving consent to relocate. This is a deliberate attempt to divide the Chenchus and create friction among them. However, they very clearly conveyed that they will not give consent to any relocation package and would continue to co-exist with the wildlife in harmony, as that is how the Chenchus always survived in the forest.

Speakers at the consultation also raised many legal concerns including non-implementation of the Forest Rights Act, non-recognition of community forest rights and habitat rights of Chenchus. They spoke on the deliberate misinterpretation of the Wildlife Protection Act to displace Chenchus in the name of making the forests ‘inviolate’, violations under PESA and lack of prior informed consent procedures, non-implementation of the Land Acquisition Act of 2013 (LARR). The recent relocation of Adivasis from Mysampet and Rampur in Kawal tiger reserve where the displaced community became landless wage labour still awaiting the promised land and cash compensation is a classic example of non-compliance with legal and statutory accountability mechanisms in relocation.  

Veteran civil rights activist Prof. Haragopal said that the State wants Chenchus out of the forest, both because Adivasi regions are mineral resource rich, but also because the capitalist order wants to extinguish the selfless and community way of living of Adivasis. Other activists who were present and spoke at the Consultation in solidarity include Usha Seethalakshmi, K. Satyavathi, Sajaya K, Dr. Ramkishan, Sandhya V, Ashalatha S, Bhanu Kalluri, Girija, Ravi Kanneganti, Shankar, Kalpana, Meera Sanghamitra, Sanjeev, Soumitri, Ravichander etc.  

The efforts over the past three months, by the Community Forest Rights Working Group of Telangana also resulted in the formation of the Chenchu Solidarity Forum (CSF), on the eve of Earth Day. As an independent citizens’ collective to support the struggles of the Chenchu Adivasi communities, co-existence and democratic governance in Nallamalla forests and ensure their rights, guaranteed by various laws and the Constitution, are not violated. 

Key demands submitted to the Telangana government are:

• Immediately stop issuing cheques and stop the process of unconstitutional relocation of the Chenchus living in Amrabad tiger reserve area.
• Implement the Forest Rights Act including recognition of Community Forest Rights and Habitat Rights, settlement of pending IFR claims and resurvey of claims rejected and pending.
• The forest department has to place in public domain the mandatory report as per WLPA (with 2006 amendment) of the scientific study conducted in consultation with the Chenchus, that proves ‘irrevocable damage to wildlife’ by the Chenchus.
• The forest department should make public the details of core and buffer zone demarcations, details of consultations conducted with concerned Gram Sabhas and details of conditions on which consent was obtained, including details of Social Impact Assessment report, R&R Plan, Gram Sabha resolutions and consent letters.
• Government must share the details of notifying villages in core and buffer zones in Amrabad Tiger Reserve. 
• Strengthen the governance of forests through co-existence of Chenchus with their forests and wildlife using the Constitutional and legal mechanisms of the PESA, FRA, LARR for community centred conservation which is globally recognized as the most sustainable form of Conservation and Climate Protection. 
• Withdraw all the false criminal cases on the Chenchu youth, community leaders and intimidation tactics to prevent them from voicing their concerns. 
• Safeguard the Nallamalla ecosystem and declare the Nallamalla forests as Chenchu Conservation Bio-Region Reserve.

Related:

Thousands of Adivasis demand the implementation of FRA 2006

Breaking: All Intervention Applications defending FRA, 2006 admitted by SC

Woman, Van Gujjar, Forest Dweller – the roles & intersectionalities in Mariam’s life

Mass protests & Sansad Gherao against continued Adivasi evictions

Compilation of Forest Rights Act, Rules, and Guidelines

Frequently Asked Questions on the Forest Rights Act, 2006

Counter Affidavit filed by MoTa in support of tribal rights in the FRA

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