A Catholic priest in western India sought police protection for his non-governmental organisation (NGO) after his staff members were attacked on a running train by Hindu nationalists who claimed they were missionaries involved in conversion activities.

A crowd of roughly 15 Hindu youth assaulted seven teachers of a Catholic NGO working in Dhule district in the western state of Maharashtra while traveling by express train. On January 16, the night of the attack, the team was on an education tour when the mob surrounded and attacked them at the Sangli railway station.

GunilalPawara, supervisor of a team of 42 teachers including 14 females who work for the NGO named Shirpur Vishwa Mandal Sevashram, stated that he was yanked from his bunk and hit on the head with a steel object until blood began to pour from a cut. As reported by the UCA News, Pawara further provided that the Hindu mob accused the team of attempting to convert indigenous tribal people, and had repeatedly asked for Father Constancio Rodrigues, the NGO’s director.

On January 20, Father Rodrigues told UCA News that he was supposed to accompany his team but was unable to do so at the last minute. He further asserted that the attackers knew the exact berth numbers of the team members, so it was a well-planned attack, but the mob clearly intended to target him.On January 21, a complaint was sent by the victim group to the Superintendent of Police, Belagavi and the Office of Chief Minister of Maharashtra.

Brief account of the attack

The group were going to Belagavi for an exchange of educational and social work experience there with the village level animators of Jana Jagaran Sanstha, Belagavi. Accordingly, on the morning of 16th January 2023, they started their journey from Shirpur District Dhule, Maharashtra to Belagavi by Goa Express (Nizamuddin Vasco Express) at 11.40 am.

As has been provided in the complaint, the group was sitting in coach number S6. Around 9.30 pm to 10 pm, near the Sangli railway station, some young men suddenly entered their coach, and started beating upthe group members while they were sleeping. They were asking questions such as, “Are you going for conversion?”. They were also repeatedly asking after Father Rodrigues.

As the mob got to know that the group members were a part of the Adivasi community, they started abusing them and uttering slurs. In addition to verbal abuse, the group members were also subjected to physical abuse. The mob used a walking stick, belonging to a disabled teacher Tara Singh ChaitramPawara, and steel kadas (bangles) to hit the group members.

Immediately after reaching Sangali railway station, the mob dragged some of the group members out of the train and took GunilalPawara to the railway police stationed standing at platform of Sangali Railway station. The police asked whether any quarrel had taken place. After getting to know the reason of the quarrel, the police questioned the mobregarding who they were, to which they replied they were locals. Post this, the culprits ran away from the spot.

The group then boarded the train again. On reaching the Belagavi railway station at around 1 am, the catholic group was surrounded by forty young men and was detained by the Belagavi railway police after getting down from the train. The railway police brought the group out of the station to the compound and handed them over to the Belagavi police. The police made all the member sit on the ground and questioned them. The questions ranged from asking where the group was travelling from, the purpose of their travel and the kind of education they were engaged in.

The police then gave protection to the group while they travelled to the premises of the Jan Jagran Training Centre within the St. Paul’s campus at Camp, Belagavi. As the group was travelling, they noticed that one of the teachers, BansilalShikarsingPawara, was missing in the group, and the group members claimed that he had been abducted by the mob that had attacked them. As the member informed the police that were accompany them, a police car went in search of the missing teacher. About half an hour later,Bansilal was dropped by two unknown men on a motor cycle, who then fled from the spot.

The district police inspector, who was accompanying the group, questioned Bansilal about his disappearance. Bansilal then informed that some men had closed his mouth and dragged him to a dark place after taking away his bag and shawl. The mob had then placed a sword on his throat and pointed a knife tohis stomach with the aim of forcing a false narrative out of him that the group members were being brought by force for conversion while the mob recorded the same. Bansilal had refused to give a false statement. He was then driven to a dark place near a bridge, close to the railway station, and threatened to be kill off if he did not comply, but Bansilal did not change his statement. After that, two members from the mob took him on a motor cycle and dropped him near the catholic group and fled away.

Action taken against the attack

As has been provided by Father Rodrigues, complaint against the above-mentioned incident have been sent to the Superintendent of Police, Belagavi and the Office of Chief Minister of Maharashtra.

The complaint can be read here.

To the said complaint, the Chief Minister’s office has sent their acknowledgement to the complaint sent by the group. The reply is provided below.

Father Rodrigues further provided that no arrests have been made yet. On being asked why no member of the attacking mob was arrested when they had approached the railway police at the Sangali Railway station, Father Rodrigues said that the police seemed as if they were siding with the culprits. Referring to the abduction of the member of the group, Father further said that the police took no action there too and it seemed as if they were either involved and knew everything or were protecting the ones who were responsible for the attack. Father had also added that even after returning, the group had to seek police protection at the NGO as they noticed some unidentified people keeping a watch on their activities.

The bogey of conversion and rising attacks on Christians

Christians account for 2.3 percent of India’s population of over 1.3 billion people, the majority of which are Hindus. Pro-Hindu organisations in India have intensified their enmity toward Christians by erroneously characterizing their institutions, such as schools and hospitals, as a front for religious conversions.Every time the issue of someone embracing the Christian faith comes up in India, the prevalent opinion is that the individual in question converted under duress or with some incentive. At one level, the illusion spun by the anti-Christian brigade that mass conversions will result in a sizable proportion of Hindus joining Christianity is the basis for such a notion gaining traction. On the other side, such a viewpoint implies a casteist perspective, wherein the upper caste Hindus are assuming the responsibility of “protecting and stopping” the tribals, Adivasis and Dalits from converting to Christianity, while having subjected them to systematic oppression, violence and exclusion since time immemorial. The rising attacks against Christians, can thus be safely described as attacks on Dalits and the marginalised of this country. 

Extremist Hindutva outfits have lately been involved in disrupting churches, prayer halls, and Christmas and Easter celebrations. The specter of mass conversion has been utilized repeatedly to harass Christian communities, indicating collective distress and uneasiness among Hindutva movements over the perceived insult to and abandonment of the Hindu faith by certain converts.

In the majority of these situations, the police and other authorities side with the perpetrators. The simple fact, however, is that Christianity in India offers no challenge to Hinduism’s demographic or philosophical might.

Related:

Chhattisgarh: 1,100 Christians converted to Hinduism in “gharwapsi” ceremony, by BJP Sec

Chhattisgarh: A dead woman’s ‘gharwapsi’ before final rites were allowed

Over 300 attacks on Christians reported this year, over 2000 women, Adivasis and Dalits injured

Ambedkar and the call to Conversion!

How diverse and inclusive is the Indian judiciary?

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If the Dutch satellite-based data had identified Sonbhadra-Singrauli in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, Korba in Chhattisgarh, Talcher in Odisha, Chandrapur in Maharashtra, Mundra in Gujarat and Durgapur in West Bengal as India’s NOx hotspots, the new Greenpeace study says, thanks to coal burning, India is the largest emitter of SO2 in the world, contributing more than 15% of global anthropogenic SO2 emissions from NASA detected hotspots.”

Causing environmental pollution and pollutants originating from human activity, anthropogenic SO2 is mainly produced from coal combustion, as also from oil and gas refining/ power generation and smelters. It is known to be impacting human health, ecosystems, agriculture, and global and regional climate.

India’s top 13 coal-fired anthropogenic SO2 hotspots identified out of the world’s 40 are Singrauli (Madhya Pradesh), producing 507 kilotons per year (kt/yr), followed by Neyveli (Tamil Nadu) 393 kt/yr, Talcher (Odisha) 347 kt/yr, Jharsuguda (Odisha) 301 kt/yr, Korba (Chhatisgarh) 280 kt/yr, Kutch (Gujarat) 228 kt/yr, Chennai (Tamil Nadu) 215 kt/yr, Visakhapatnam (Andhra Pradesh) 171 kt/yr, Ramagundam (Telangana) 157 kt/yr, Raigarh (Maharashtra) 154 kt/yr, Mundra (Gujarat) 148 kt/yr, Chandrapur (Maharashtra) 132 kt/yr, and Koradi (Maharashtra) 114 kt/yr.

Titled “Global SO2 emission hotspot database: Ranking the world’s worst sources of SO2 pollution” by NGO researchers Sunil Dahiya and Lauri Myllyvirta, the study states, “More than 51% of total anthropogenic SO2 emissions are emitted in regions of high coal consumption for power generation and industries. Coal combustion for power generation is the major emission source, with smaller contributions from oil refineries/consumption, smelters and others.” 
 

Shockingly, the study says, India is one of the three countries – the other two being Saudi Arabia and Iran – whose “air pollutant emissions from power plants and other industries continue to increase”. Then, there are Russia, South Africa, Mexico and Turkey, whose emissions are “currently not increasing but there is not a lot of progress in tackling them either.” 
 

Commenting on India, the study states, “The primary reason for India’s high emission output is the expansion of coal-based electricity generation over the past decade. The vast majority of plants in India lack flue-gas desulfurization technology to reduce their air pollution.” 
 

The study continues, “Singrauli, Neyveli, Talcher, Jharsuguda, Korba, Kutch, Chennai, Ramagundam, Chandrapur and Koradi thermal power plants or clusters are the major emission hotspots in the country”, adding, “In India, there has been an increase of SO2 emissions at already existing hotspots as well as the emergence of new sites generating emissions across the country.” 
 

Trends in anthropogenic SO2 emissions by country since 2005

Criticizing the Government of India’s failure to control SO2 emission, the study underlines, “In a first step to combat the pollution levels, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change introduced, for the first time, SO2 emission limits for coal-fired power plants in December 2015, but the deadline for the installation of flue-gas desulfurization (FGD) in power plants has been shifted from 2017 to 2022.”

In all, the study says, NASA satellite data captured more than 500 major point sources of SO2 emissions across the globe, including natural sources such as volcanoes. “Excluding all natural sources from our analysis and only investigating anthropogenic sources of SO2, we found a close correlation of high SO2 emission levels within regions that have high fossil fuel consumption i.e., geographies with high coal burning, oil refining and combustion as well as smelters.”

“Sixty percent of the total emissions detected by the satellite are anthropogenic. Regions with high capacity of coal combustion for power generation and industries, smelters, oil and gas refining/combustion contributed 31%, 10% and 19% respectively”, it adds.

Courtesy: Counter View

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RTI Commissioner Shridhar Acharyulu (Ravindra Joshi/HT PHOTO)
 

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Now, when the heat and dust of over such monumental shame is settling down, it is time to take stock of the situation. This should begin with the acknowledgment of those who are the prime movers of this news into the public domain.

First mover and shaker of this news is the “Team Koshish” (field-action programme of Tata Institute of Social Sciences) that conducted the ‘Social Audit’ of the Muzafarpur shelter home and brought out the shocking irregularities. The ‘Koshish team’ is worthy of praise because they have worked in an extremely hostile milieu to audit the lives of the marginalised destitute, homeless and beggars and brought out the graphic details.

Even though, all the members of the ‘Koshish team’ deserve accolade, the special one must go to Mohammad Tarique (an Ashoka Fellow) who led the team from the front with excellence and passion. He selflessly supervised an outfit of youth committed to prepare the audit report impartially and bring the finding in an extremely tight time frame.

The second kudos goes to Atul Prasad, Principal Secretary, ‘Social Welfare Department’ government of Bihar for envisioning such an unprecedented social audit. He deserves bigger accolade for accepting the truth and publishing the “TISS Report” and making it public. The truth may have remained buried in the files of Social Welfare department of Bihar had it not the gone public with the TISS report

The third person who deserves credit accolade is Ms Harpreet Kaur, Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP), Muzafarpur. It is her investigation which had made skeletons tumble out. She showed promptness to lodge the FIR in this case and arrested the key accused. She has shown to the country what an upright police officer can do if allowed to handle such sensitive cases.

The case so far and where it’s heading? A nationally reputed NGO carried out a social audit of the state run shelter home and based on evidence of ‘inmates’ reported the instances sexual assault on them. The social welfare department of the state made the report public.

Following which the Superintendent of police filed FIR and book the culprits. In the process police have video-graphed evidence based on statements of victims. The independent medical board from reputed medical college of the state corroborated the incidents of rape.

There was a public hue and cry for speedy disposal of case and exemplary punishment for those found guilty. After that the Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar handed over the case to the CBI for investigation. He declared that no culprit, however powerful will be spared.

It is likely that the CBI will carry out further investigation of this case and collect more clinching evidences to make it a water tight case. Then the case will be heard in a court and justice will to deliver justice in a time frame.

It is now clear that most of the rape was committed on minors and falls within the jurisdiction of Protection of Children from Sexual Offenses (POCSO) Act 2012.

Under the new provision of POSCO Act that was amended in 2018 after “Asifa rape case” states that “all accused are guilty till proven innocent.” This is a significant shift from the previous position that, “All accused are innocent till proven guilty.”

This Muzafarpur shelter home case is a rarest of the rare case, where under the new provision of POSCO Act 2018 the accused can be given death sentence for raping of minors below 12. It is expected from the custodian of justice to award award maximum punishment to those pathological criminals found guilty of committing such heinous crime.

Muzafarpur shelter home expose has blown over the lid of such horrific crime. The National Human Right Commission Reports testify to the fact that such sexual abuse of girls and women are more of a norm than exception in Mental Hospitals government, private or NGO run homes.
It is high time that all the state government to fast-track all such social audit and make it public. An honest audit by the bunch of committed youth like those of ‘Koshish team’ can deliver the desired results.

Such social audit should have full state support and protection and be combined with speedy follow up action. The various reforms suggested in the audit report should be implemented expeditiously by the state governments and monitored periodically.

Another concern is how to reorganize the rehabilitation programme. These girls are victims of social and psychological malaise of the society; they have been protection in the shelter homes to escape from the society. Now in such protected home they have been physically and psychologically humiliated. A full proof rehabilitation programme of these victims poses a big challenge to the state governments.

There are no quick-fix solutions to such problems. The heart of the matter is that governments are absolving themselves from the welfare responsibilities and handing it over to some non-governmental organizations. This is the biggest take away from this story.

There is no quick fix solution to such national shame. This malaise will not be set right unless the governments become proactive in discharging the social duties. It is a very serious issue and the response to it should be in proportion to the pandemonium created in the country today.

Syed Ali Mujtaba is a journalist based in Chennai. He can be contacted at syedalimujtaba@yahoo.com

Courtesy: https://countercurrents.org
 

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Global businesses and grassroots human rights activists may seem like strange bedfellows.  But as attacks on basic democratic freedoms and the rule of law intensify around the world, they may have more shared values and interests than one might think.

We know businesses are driven by the bottom line. If they didn’t seek to increase profits, they simply wouldn’t exist. But we also know—and many business leaders are coming around to the idea—that long-term success relies on more than just profit generation and is linked to a range of external factors such as transparency, certainty, stability. And a social license to operate.

Failures to understand that social license, and in particular to prevent and respond to the human rights impacts of their work, have thrust many global businesses into an unwanted spotlight. They didn’t need to find themselves there.

Because human rights defenders use public advocacy as a key tool for change, businesses often make the mistake of seeing them as additional drivers of cost. Reputational damage and operational risks for a company are expensive. Because human rights defenders—such as lawyers, trade unionists, community leaders, or NGO workers—use public advocacy as a key tool for change, businesses often make the mistake of seeing them as additional drivers of cost.

However, business should see human rights defenders as priceless allies. They are the canaries in the coalmines, pointing to when governance failures become real financial, legal, and reputational risks to business. They are also the witnesses to corporate abuse of communities and the environment.

Because of this, the work of defenders often makes those in power uncomfortable—both states and non-state actors. They are targeted with laws and policies to stifle their activities, and face intimidation and threats to their work and their lives.

Yet without the work of defenders, whole societies and economies lose out. And that means businesses lose out, too.

Take the case of the 24 April, 2013 Rana Plaza factory collapse in Bangladesh. When the dust cleared, the largest industrial accident in contemporary times resulted in the deaths of 1129 workers. Multinational brands who sourced from Bangladesh had long known the government had little capacity, and less will, to make important changes—hiring and training labor inspectors, updating fire codes and retrofitting buildings to meet them, and so on. They also knew local authorities and business partners had engaged in active suppression of labor unions and workers speaking out. By many accounts, if those voices had been heard, the tragic death toll would never have been so high.
 

Wikimedia Commons/Sharat Chowdhury (Some rights reserved)

The aftermath of the 2013 Rana Plaza factory collapse in Bangladesh.

For those defenders trying to address such concerns on the ground it is, in a very real sense, a matter of life and death. Just ask Laura Caceres, who spoke at this year’s UN Forum on Business and Human Rights to honor her mother. Berta Caceres was gunned down last March in Honduras for her work defending campesina communities against abuses linked to the Agua Zarca dam.

The global response to Rana Plaza kicked off a sustained effort by major trading partners—and home countries—the US and the EU, as well as the ILO, to improve coordination and adopt a structural approach to improving labor rights in Bangladesh. The multi-stakeholder Bangladesh Accord has workers and unions at the table and on equal footing with government and businesses to improve workplace safety and worker voice. Berta Caceres’ death led the Finnish state and Dutch pension fund FMO to divest from the project. It has also refocused the attention of states, development organizations and the UN to the ongoing harassment of defenders in Honduras.

These cases show business can make a difference. It has a unique ability to create, maintain, and defend space for civil society through three tools: leverage, leadership, and partnerships.

How do these work? Take as an example a government drafting a law that aims to close down space for NGOs to operate. In addition to running counter to international law, this would also close off channels for businesses to benefit from NGOs’ work—whether implementing community projects or helping train workers. So how might businesses respond?

They can use the leverage provided by access, personal relationships and market share to push back on authoritarian impulses. To take just one example, when 30 global brands and global trade unions joined together to speak out against violent dispersal of protests and detention of activists in Cambodia in 2014, not only were the activists released, but the underlying issues of minimum wage took center stage in brand discussions with the government.

Businesses, and especially progressive businesses, also need to show leadership. In 2015, Adidas released a policy statement on human rights defenders that clearly led the pack, creating a company-wide commitment to speak out in defense of fundamental freedoms in the countries where they source. It takes a lot for a business to get in front, especially when they know that NGOs will be watching carefully to see those policies implemented. But setting the bar high has consumer appeal and can drive a race to the top.

Finally, businesses have resources. Partnerships directly with NGOs can be contentious, and businesses need to listen to and address the concerns of co-optation and whitewashing. But the global environment for traditional funding mechanisms is increasingly toxic. According to UN experts and leading funders, nearly a hundred governments have put limits on NGOs’ operations, including the ability to accept foreign (especially NGO) funding. For the financial survival of civil society, seeking support from businesses might be an option—if it is on equal footing and with clear redlines to maintain independence.

Civil society needs space and protection to carry out its work, and it is not just a moral imperative, but an investment opportunity for businesses to help secure that space and protection. The leadership, leverage and solidarity shown by companies who see support to civic freedoms and human right defenders as part of core business will pay long-term dividends.

Sarah Brooks works for the Geneva-based NGO, the International Service for Human Rights. She leads their work in Asia, and also supports defenders seeking to advance corporate accountability.

This article was first appeared on Open Democracy
 

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The advertisement by HDRC, formerly Behavioral Science Centre, situated on St Xavier’s College campus, Ahmedabad,  was for the post of safai karmacharis (sweepers), insisting that it would give preference to the "unreserved category".
 

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In 2014, the Delhi High Court had ruled that both the parties have been guilty of violating the rules laid out in the Foreign Contribution Regulations Act  2010 (FCRA) and ordered the government and the Election Commission to take immediate action against two parties. The FCRA bans political parties from receiving funds from any foreign source. In its original provision, the law defines foreign source to include any company with foreign investment of above 50%.  Finance Minister, Arun Jaitley’s clever-by-half amendment says, “‘Provided that where the nominal value of share capital is within the limits specified for foreign investments under the Foreign Exchange Management Act, 1999, or the rules and regulations made there under, then, notwithstanding the nominal value of the share capital of a company being more than one half of such value at the time of making the contribution, such company shall not be deemed a foreign source.”

This allows companies like Vendanta to pour money in the kitty of these political parties.

To discuss this controversial issue and its implications –at a time when the Modi regime is out to stiffle dissent and the legitimate functioning of rights driven organisations in the non-governmental sector – NewsClick interviewed Prashant Bhushan, senior advocate who also represents the Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL).

Courtesy: NewsClick

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