The post Scroll.in contributor Malini Subramaniam wins CPJ International Press Freedom award appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Shortly after we published the story below by Parijata Bharadwaj, we received the following email message:
 

Dear Colleagues,
 
We are happy to inform you that two complaints in the cases of Ms. Shalini Gera, Ms. Isha Khandelwal and Ms. Malini Subramaniam have reached the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC). The Focal Point for Human Rights Defenders in NHRC informed me that yesterday itself there were some complaints received in this regard, and notice has already gone to Director General of Police, Chattisgarh.
 
However, because of intervention by Justice Murugesan, Member, NHRC this morning, Ms. Chhaya Sharma Deputy Inspector General of Police (Investigation Division) is personally looking into this matter and directly speaking with the police officials. The complaint is also copied to her.
These two files are being placed before the acting chairperson of NHRC right now to order investigation by NHRC, immediate police protection and urgent action at their end.
 
Yours sincerely,
Henri Tiphagne
Honorary National Working Secretary
———————————————————-

Lawyers, journalists, activists highlighting the grievances of adivasis are being terrorised into leaving the district

The developments in the national capital following the crackdown at JNU have once again brought the authoritarian, fascist nature of the current regime into sharp focus. While the intensity of the attack unleashed by state actors and Hindutva’s vigilantes has come as a surprise for some, it is important to note that this is not an aberration. It is but an extension of what is being faced by the adivasis, Dalits and other marginalised communities of this country on a daily basis.

One such target of the unrelenting repression is, and has been, the mineral rich land of Bastar. While this in itself as an old, ongoing story, taking advantage of the fact that public attention for the moment is riveted on developments in New Delhi, the police and district administration have moved swiftly and deviously to force lawyers and journalists highlighting adivasi grievances out of the district.

The aim is simple: to wipe out any resistance to the neo-liberal ‘development’ agenda.  While the earlier UPA governments were also wedded to the same agenda, it is now being pursued more aggressively under the new dispensation at the Centre.

With the prolonged conflict between the Indian State and the Maoists in adivasi regions, the former has perfected a simple you-are-either-with-us –or-them script. Anyone who blindly conforms to the diktats of the state actors is a nationalist. Anyone who fails to toe the line, dares deviate even by a millimetre from the official line is dubbed an “anti-national” and worse, a “Maoist”.

It is this very definition which is currently being applied by the local administration against the Jagdalpur Legal Aid Group (JagLAG) – run by Shalini Gera and Isha Khandelwal to safeguard the constitutional rights of the socially and economically deprived sections of Bastar – journalist Malini Subramaniam and an independent researcher of considerable repute, Bela Bhatia.

On the night of February 17, 2016 the local police at Jagdalpur summoned the landlord who had rented his house to Shalini and Isha to the police station and detained him at the thana for two hours to pressurise him into asking his tenants to quit within a week. To add weight to their threats, the police seized the landlord’s sole means of livelihood – his taxi – on some pretext.

Taking advantage of the fact that public attention for the moment is riveted on developments in New Delhi, the police and district administration have moved swiftly and deviously to force lawyers and journalists highlighting adivasi grievances out of the district

At the same time, the police detained the female domestic worker of Malini and kept her in the police station till late in the evening, in gross violation of the law. The situation deteriorated further on February 18, 2016 when the police once again summoned the domestic worker of Malini and refused to let her leave the station. Malini’s husband who had gone to enquire the reason for the detention of their domestic help was also detained.

Finally, the police released both of them but by then Malini too had been given a written eviction notice by her landlord, forcing her to vacate the house with her family the same day.

Things did not improve for the Jagdalpur Legal Aid Group which became the target of sloganeering of the police-friendly Samajik Ekta Manch during the day. In the evening (February 18) JagLAG’s landlord was once again called to the police station and detained for hours. On his return, it was apparent that the police had forced him into asking JagLAG to vacate the rented premise within 24 hours.

JagLAG and Bela approached the local authorities seeking an end to this persecution but none of the visits have resulted in any effective change in their eviction status.

Why is the local administration hell bent on getting rid of them? What is it that the Chattisgarh’s BJP government so afraid of that it is resorting to such tactics?

The answer is simple: they cannot tolerate the presence in the district of anyone who draws attention to, or works for, the constitutionally guaranteed rights of the adivasis and holds the administration accountable.

With the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) coming to power at the Centre, Bastar has witnessed a sustained escalation in the violence unleashed by the State against the local adivasis under the garb of its military campaign against the Maoists.

The heavy militarisation in the region has led to increased restrictions on the basic freedoms of the people. Para-military forces with absolutely no knowledge about the local culture or landscape in the region, which have been pressed into service in the region, function on the assumption that every villager is a Maoist unless proved to the contrary. This has resulted in an increase in the number of villagers being arrested, illegally detained, even being killed in fake encounters.

JagLAG, Malini and Bela’s ‘fault’ lies in their refusal to remain mute spectators to the growing deprivation and increasing oppression of the adivasis. They have been working with local adivasi activists like Soni Sori, Linga Ram Kodopi, Sukal Prasad Nag and the people fighting for the recognition of the dignity and rights of adivasis. Thanks to their combined efforts, since end-2014 Bastar has seen several peaceful movements by the local people demanding the enforcement of their rights.

In one instance, thousands of villagers peacefully assembled outside the Kukanar thana, to demand that the police release Sukdi. She had been kidnapped by the police to coerce her husband Ayata, a local leader, to comply with the demands of the police. Then there was the large rally of people from the village of Revali who peacefully demanded that the district collector order an inquiry into the fake ‘encounter’ death of Nuppo Bhima.

In both instances, the adivasis had adopted peaceful means while placing their demands before the state officials. The presence of JagLAG, Bela and Malini during the rallies ensured legal support, detailed documentation, and media coverage of the demands.

The above were the first of many such peaceful gatherings of villagers seeking justice before the State officials. Here was opportunity for the state personnel to show they were concerned about the well-being of the people, open to listen to their grievances. Instead, the rallies were labeled as being motivated by Naxalites and villagers who had played a leading role in the rallies were threatened, or arrested by the police and implicated in false cases.

Why is the local administration hell bent on getting rid of them? What is it that the Chattisgarh’s BJP government so afraid of that it is resorting to such tactics? The answer is simple: they cannot tolerate the presence in the district of anyone who draws attention to, or works for, the constitutionally guaranteed rights of the adivasis and holds the administration accountable

The presence of JagLAG and Bela in the region had created a space for students, journalists, filmmakers, academicians and others to visit the district and witness for themselves the ground reality. Since its presence in the Bastar, JagLAG has been instrumental in facilitating several fact finding trips of activists, academicians and researchers into different areas of the region. The last few months saw visits by two fact-finding teams into Bijapur and Sukma to probe complaints of sexual violence by the security personnel. The fact-finding teams uncovered the extensive violence unleashed on the villagers, especially the large scale sexual violence against adivasi women.

In one of the fact findings, the team went to five villages in Basaguda block of Bijapur – Pegdapalli, Chinna Gellur, Pedda Gellur, Gundam and Burgicheru. In all these villages women narrated harrowing tales of sexual violence by the security forces. They complained of being stripped and assaulted. Even their nipples were pinched ostensibly to establish whether the claim of being a breast-feeding mother was true or not. Several women had bruises and injuries on their person.

The women agreed to accompany the fact-finding team to the collectorate and police station seeking action against the security forces. Despite the initial reluctance, because of the serious nature of the alleged offences and the pressure on the administration, an FIR was reluctantly registered against the security forces.

Meanwhile, separate fact-finding teams of the adivasi mahasabha and the Congress party also demanded action against the errant troops. Despite this, there were two further instances of large-scale violence against women by security forces in Bijapur which was recently highlighted by the Congress party.

In all these incidents, Bela played an instrumental role in not only working to find out the experiences of the adivasis but also continuously and tirelessly working with the various teams to ensure that the pressure on the police to take cognisance of these offences is maintained. JagLAG is representing several people implicated on charges of being Maoists, including Soni Sori, local journalists Somaru Nag and Santosh Yadav and other villagers, seeking justice in the matter of the extra-judicial killings in Sarkeguda.

The Chattisgarh government is thus faced with activists who do not shy away from taking up the issues of the people, lawyers who fearlessly fight for the rights of their clients and journalists who courageously report the disturbing facts. Here are human rights defenders (HRDs) whose presence ensures support to the local people to continue to strive for justice. Instead, of using this opportunity to establish itself as a pro-people regime, the government has taken recourse to its age-old tactics: labelling, threats and warnings.

It started with ‘friendly warnings’ about three years ago. But in the last 18 months the friendly warnings have turned to threats. From veiled threats to restrictions on the right to practice law, the objective is to remove from the scene anyone attempting to hold the State accountable.

The threats varied in nature depending on the person being targeted. Malini, Bela and Soni were subjected to sloganeering by local vigilante groups. The house and property of Soni and Malini were vandalised. On one of their visits to a village, Bela and Soni were hounded by a mob labelling them as naxalites. For JagLAG, the threat has been in the form of a local mob aggressively attempting to prevent them from appearing in Court.

Contrary to the State’s expectation the threats did not deter the HRDs from continuing their work in the area. It is because of this that the police have chosen to go after those who are more vulnerable: domestic help, landlords. The aim of the BJP government is clear: to isolate and attack.

With a flurry of MOUs being signed in the region the State has started aggressively implementing its ‘clearing’ operations to milk the mineral rich resources for profit. The last few months have seen an intense military campaign against the locals with the aim of clearing out the area, making it safe for ‘development’.

It is immaterial to the State that this process has led to a drastic escalation in the number of arbitrary arrests, staged ‘surrenders’ and fake ‘encounter’ deaths in the region. What does make it angry is the documentation and transmission of information. It is for this reason that it has become imperative to force Malini, Bela and JagLAG out of the region.

Malini has already been forced to leave and pressure on JagLAG and Bela is being built-up by the hour. Now is not the time to be silent but to unite and challenge a repressive regime which under the garb of nationalism has unleashed a reign of oppression and tyranny.

(The writer is a lawyer, who was with the Jagdalpur legal aid group from 2013 to 2015. She is presently practising at Bombay High Court)

Attacking the Defenders of Freedom, Chhatisgarh: Lawyers and Journos being Forced Out

The post NHRC intervenes as BJP govt. hounds defenders of adivasis’ rights in Bastar appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Days after Scroll contributor Malini Subramaniam at Bastar in Chattisgarh came under pressure from local groups and the police following to her reportage on police atrocities, Isha Khandewal, the lawyer representing Malini and a member of legal aid group JagLAG, has said they are being forced to leave Jagdalpur. JagLAG (Jagdalpur Legal Aid group), a non-profit that has been providing free aid to tribal communities in south Chhattisgarh’s five Naxal-affected districts, chose to legally represent Malini Subramaniam following a physical assault on her property in Bastar on February 8.

Malini Subramaniam, a journalist writing for scroll.in has been served an eviction notice by her landlord while her husband Ashim is still being held inside the police station and not let out. The landlord of the Jagdalpur Legal Aid group, who’s arms have been twisted by the local police by seizing his sole vehicle that is a means of livelihood, may also have to give in to the pressure. The message is clear. Freedom of Association, Movement and Expression are being openly throttled in the Bastar region, yet again. The state government is the same that controls the reigns at the Centre. The Chhatisgarh government wants the Jagdalpur legal aid group, an intrepid group of women lawyers who have been working in the Bastar region for three years, ensuring some legal rights for the Adivasis, out.
 
Sabrangindia has been consistently carrying reports of the resistance by Adivasis and the repression in Chhatisgarh. Here we reproduce a public appeal made by the Jagdalpur Legal Aid Group, a few minutes before the midnight hour on February 18-19, 2016.
 
 Things are taking an ugly turn in Jagdalpur.  
 
  First there were whispered threats, 'Don't go to Bijapur, the police will arrest you if you go there again'. Then, there was a whole week of public lynching of JagLAG as defenders of "blood-thirstly Naxalites" by the Samajik Ekta Manch, a vigilante group formed by the police.  At the same time, the local Bar Association again renewed their campaign to stop our practice by harassing the local lawyers standing with us.
 
Then, late last night, police visited our landlord – who is a driver by profession, and took him away to the police station. He was kept there till wee hours of this morning, and dropped back in a police vehicle; his car having been impounded.  Our badly shaken landlord informed us at 2:00 am this morning that he has no option but to ask us to vacate our house and office within a week.
 
Things have been rocky for us in Jagdalpur for a while now.  For a year and a half now, we are being hounded out by the local police.  From giving thinly veiled threats at press conferences that the police are closely monitoring NGOs providing "legal aid to Naxalites", to informing our clients that the police are about to arrest us for our Naxalite activities, to claiming before visiting journalists and researchers that we are merely a "Naxalite front", various officials of the police have been out to get us.
 
We have had police diligently investigating "anonymous" complaints that we are "fraudulent" lawyers.  For which, we had to make multiple trips to the police station with all our impeccable certificates and sound credentials. Then the local Bar Association, clearly prompted by the police, took out a resolution prohibiting our practice in the local courts. We countered this by challenging this resolution in the State Bar Council and obtaining an interim order allowing our practice. Unable to get at us any other way, now, the police are resorting to pressuring our landlord and his family.
 
The timing of these events does not escape our notice. This is coming at a time when the whole countryside of Bastar is on fire. Under the guise of anti-Naxal operations, the security forces are indulging in rape, pillage and plunder. With teams of women activists, we have documented at least three cases of mass sexual violence in the past three months itself, where security forces have run amok in the villages, stripping women, playing with their naked bodies and indulging in gangrape, looting their precious food supplies, and destroying their homes and granaries. The number of so-called "encounters" is at an all-time high, people are simply "disappearing" from villages in large numbers, only to show up in the list of "surrendered" or "arrested" Naxalites several days or weeks later. The local police and administration are talking in one voice of "clearing" the area within one year.
 
In this scenario, all who are challenging the official narrative, are being silenced. Social mobilizations are being orchestrated by the police to provide a cover to their illegal harassment of journalists, lawyers, activists. When mass gangrapes in Bijapur were being uncovered, a group calling itself the "Naxal peedit Sangharsh samiti" under the leadership of the ex-Salwa Judum leader Madhukar Rao, took out noisy belligerent rallies against Soni Sori, Bela Bhatia and "outside NGOs", threatening all of us with physical violence if we entered Bijapur again. When Malini Subramaniam wrote about the fake surrenders of Maoists, or the fake encounters, a motley group led by the nephew of the local MLA, calling themselves the "Samajik Ekta Manch" launched a vilification campaign against her. 

When we tried to get her complaint of stones thrown into her house registered, the Manch publicly declared us as their next target, for defending "khoonkhar Naxalites" ( खूंखार नक्सली – dreaded naxalites) and going to villages inciting people against the state.(राज्य सत्ता के खिलाफ भड़काते हैं).The local Bar Association also renewed their fatwa against local lawyers working with us..
 
Unable to stop us from continuing our work here, the police have now resorted to threatening others associated with us.  Prachi, the young household help working at Malini's, was summoned to the police station twice yesterday for interrogation, and kept there for hours.  Despite the clear letter of the law that women witnesses can only be examined at their place of residence, she was taken away to the police station late at night for questioning, much to the alarm of her family. She has been taken to the police station again this morning and is still there.  Malini's landlord,who lives in Raipur, was also summoned to the thana this morning, and by now has also issued an eviction notice to her.  Malini's husband, Ashim, who was called inside the thana in the afternoon, is also now being held inside and not being allowed outside.

Our landlord, a person of very modest means, is also a member of the minority community, and vulnerable in this climate of pervasive fear.  Our landlord's family have always had the greatest love and concern for us, which we return in equal measure.  We understand that they had no choice this time but to ask us to vacate. We also understand that it would be exceedingly difficult to find another rental place in this time of inflamed passions and provoked agitations.  We are still trying. 
 
 We take solace in the despair apparent in the highest echelons of police, who have had to stoop to such crude levels of indecency to throw us out of Jagdalpur. 

  Shalini Gera and Isha Khandelwal have issued this statement.

The post Attacking the Defenders of Freedom, Chhatisgarh: Lawyers and Journos being Forced Out appeared first on SabrangIndia.

It was on Sunday (February 7, 2016) evening, that a group of 20-odd men from the Samajik Ekta Manch, a newly formed group that claims to be working to counter the spread of Naxalism in Bastar region, staged a demonstration outside Subramaniam's house. She has identified two of the men, since they had visited her house on January 10 and warned her against writing articles that tarnished the image of the police. Later that night, around 11 pm, the police had turned up at her house for questioning.

The month-long process of intimidation had culminated in an attack on Subramaniam's home in the early hours of Monday. Around 2.30 am, stones were hurled at her house, shattering the rear window of her car. The local police initially refused to file an FIR.

After reports of the attack appeared in both local and national media, and there was widespread condemnation of the incident, the police registered an FIR was filed against unnamed persons for the offences of house-trespass and "mischief causing damage to the amount of fifty rupees and more".
Isha Khandelwal, Subramaniam's lawyer, pointed out that the FIR had several holes in it. "While registering the FIR, the police has ignored the incident that took place in the evening before the assault. The police has, in effect, refused to accept the obvious fact that what happened in the night happened as a result of the incident of the evening, thus making both incidents part of one single continuous transaction.

Also, the action of the Samajik Ekta Manch's action in the evening on its own amounts to an illegal act under Sections [of the Indian Penal Code] such as 117, 143,147,153 [relating to unlawful assembly, promoting enmity between classes and other charges] which are all cognisable. Then why was an FIR for that incident where Malini has recognised people not been registered? Also the sections they have put up for the incident that took place in the night are ones that attract simple imprisonment even though offences under Section 440,  451, 452, 457 [relating to house trespass] have been clearly made out.”

Meanwhile, in a press conference, members of the Samajik Ekta Manch denied any involvement in the attack and claimed they were simply protesting against Subramaniam's writings in a "democratic manner". The press release of the Samajik Ekta Manch can be read below. See also our earlier story at  https://www.sabrangindia.in/article/nwmi-condemns-attack-malini-subramaniam

Statements in support
Support has continued to pour in for Subramaniam. The Editors' Guild of India issued a statement expressing concern over attempts to intimidate her. The human rights organisation Amnesty International also issued a statement, calling at the attack "another indicator of the increasingly hostile atmosphere in which journalists and human rights defenders operate in Chhattisgarh. The government of Chhattisgarh must not just sit on its hands and watch journalists being threatened and harassed," said Makepeace Sitlhou, Campaigner at Amnesty International India. "They must act on their promise to protect journalists from being attacked simply for doing their work.”

Chhattisgarh Bachao Andolan, a non-profit in the state, has also issued a statement asking the government to ensure such attacks do not take place. It said an attempt was being made to create front organisations that would cover-up for the police.

Full text of the Editors' Guild statement
The Editors Guild of India is deeply concerned by the intimidation of a contributor/stringer of the online magazine Scroll.in, Malini Subramaniam, currently based in Jagdalpur town of Bastar region in Chhattisgarh.

On Monday, February 8, a group of unidentified persons allegedly hurled stones at her home in which the rear window of her car parked in the compound was shattered. The incident took place within hours of a mob of 20 people who are part of a social group called Samajik Ekta Manch, which comprises of political workers of all major parties in Bastar and some former Salwa Judum activists claiming to be anti-Maoists, gathering outside her home Sunday evening and protesting against her writings as being pro-Maoists. They even accused her of being a Maoist sympathizer. Ms Subramaniam has been living with her daughter in Jagdalpur for four years now. While she is working as a stringer/contributor for the online news site Scroll.in for a little over one year, she was previously working on a project for the International Red Cross in Bastar. It was perhaps in the context of a series of her recent reports in Scroll.in that were perceived to be against the police that the Samajik Ekta Manch activists recently met her at her residence last week – this came after several inquiries and questioning of her by the local police themselves.

Bastar has been in the throes of an armed conflict. Two local stringers working for a newspaper have been arrested by the police on charges of aiding the Maoists and are languishing in jail. The Manch activists reportedly took objected to her reportage saying it was in support of the Maoists and against the development of the region and that she was not giving the others versions. While the activists and the police are free to place their point of view, even counter the stories that she has written, the physical and mental intimidation of the Scroll.in writer, Ms Subramaniam, and the attempt to stop her from reporting from the region is not acceptable; it’s a crime to attack someone’s home. The incident is highly condemnable and against the tenets of the freedom of the press. That the local police have not deemed it fit to register an FIR in this incident, smacks of partisan behaviour. The Editors Guild of India urgently calls for the intervention of the Chattisgarh Chief Minister and hopes that he would ensure a free and fair probe into the matter.

On February 10, 2016, the New York based Committee to Protect Journalists has also issued the following statement:
Indian authorities should immediately investigate the harassment of and threats against journalist Malini Subramaniam, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Assailants on Monday pelted Subramaniam's home in Bastar, in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh, with rocks, shattering the rear window of her car, according to news reports. Subramaniam, who has reported on human rights abuses and the conflict between Maoist groups and the state in Chhattisgarh for the independent English-language news website Scroll.in, told CPJ that a group of about 20 men demonstrated outside her house on Sunday evening, accusing her of supporting Maoist groups and chanting, "Death to Malini Subramaniam."

"Chhattisgarh police must send a firm message that vigilante attacks and mob violence against any citizen, any journalist, are unacceptable," said CPJ Asia Program Senior Research Associate Sumit Galhotra. "Authorities must fully and immediately investigate this attack on Malini Subramaniam, make sure the perpetrators face justice, and preserve the safety of all journalists."

In an interview with Scroll.in, Subramaniam said she recognized two of the men from the group, and that they belonged to major political parties in the state. She also said she recognized men from the crowd as members of the anti-Maoist group Samajik Ekta Manch who had previously visited her to discuss her coverage of the decades-old, low-intensity conflict between Maoist rebels and the government.

The group of men urged her neighbors to join them in pelting her home with stones, alleging that Subramaniam had been supplying arms to Maoists and that she could plant explosives in neighboring houses, according to reports.

In the last month, police officials have come to Subramaniam's home several times, once late at night, to interrogate her about her reporting, she told CPJ. "There is pressure to cover their version of the story," she said.

Subramaniam told CPJ that while police allowed her to file a complaint, they initially refused to file a First Information Report, a necessary step to set in motion a police investigation. On Wednesday, police finally did register a First Information Report, but Subramaniam told CPJ that it was weak because it did not name any individual and because the charges related only to trespassing and damage to her property.

The online directory for Chhattisgarh police was unavailable at time of documentation. When CPJ reached the superintendent of police in Bastar district, R.N. Dash, at a phone number provided by local journalists, he declined to comment and declined to pass CPJ on to someone else for comment.
Reporting from the region poses serious challenges: According to CPJ research, police often pressure, harass, or abuse journalists in an effort to silence critical reporting or to compel them to serve as informants. Meanwhile Maoists have attacked journalists they accuse of being informants for police, according to CPJ research. In 2015, Chhattisgarh police arrested two journalists–Somaru Nag and Santosh Yadav–on unsubstantiated allegations that they were aligned with Maoists. Both Nag and Yadav remain jailed.

The post Whither Freedom: The Chhatisgarh attack on journalists appeared first on SabrangIndia.

We, members of the Network of Women in Media, India, strongly condemn the shocking attack on the residence of Malini Subramaniam, a journalist based in Jagdalpur, Chhattisgarh and correspondent for the news site Scroll.In, and the continuous attempts to intimidate and threaten her into silence.
 
According to reports in the news site, Scroll.In,  a group of around 20 persons had come to her residence at about 6p.m. on February 7,  and shouted slogans attacking her, including 'Naxali Samarthak Bastar Chodo. Malini Subramaniam Mordabad' (Naxal supporter, leave Bastar. Death to Malini Subramaniam). The mob apparently tried to instigate neighbours to attack her and said that she was a Naxal supporter. Early on February 8, morning, at around 2.30a.m.,  a motorcycle slowed down her home and threw stones at her residence. 
 
Ms Subramaniam has identified two of the men in the mob – Manish Parakh and Sampat Jha. Both had visited her residence on January 10 last month and were members to the Samajik Ekta Manch, a Jagdalpur based forum formed to counter Naxalism in Bastar and support the work of the police in the area. Parakh is the secretary of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Yuva Morcha and that Sampat Jha is a member of the Congress in Jagdalpur. 
 
The online news site, Scroll, has documented the level of intimidation faced by Ms Subramaniam and has pointed out that, over the last year, she has been writing consistently on issues of adivasis and of displacement, mass sexual violence as well as other human rights violations. It is these reports that the Manch appears to have targeted as being 'pro-naxal' and anti-police. Subsequent to the Jan 10 'visit' by members of this Manch, Ms Subramaniam also received late night enquiries from the local police and had to face a number of questions and submit documents giving proof of her identity. The news-site had tried to take up the instances of intimidation with Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh but received no response.
 
It is clear that the local police, which is tasked with protecting its citizens, has chosen to look the other way while the mob demonstrated outside her residence. It has made no attempt to register an FIR or investigate the incident, much less ensure the safety and protection of MsSubramaniam and her daughter.
 
Already, journalists across the country have lodged strong protests over the arrest and continued incarceration of two journalists from Chhattisgarh, SantoshYadav and Somaru Nag. Now, in this incident, the indifference of the police and the state administration as well as the Chief Minister is a dangerous portent for freedom of expression and for the safety and security of media persons.
 
We demand that Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh immediately announce a full and thorough investigation into the incident and take steps to ensure the safety of Ms Subramaniam. His failure to do so can only be taken as an indication of his tacit support for such heinous and coercive tactics.

The post NWMI condemns the attack on Malini Subramaniam appeared first on SabrangIndia.