In the month of July 2023, a week from now, a Jharkhand-based journalist Rupesh Kumar Singh will be completing one year behind bars, after having been arrested under the draconian Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA).
His spouse, activist Ipsa Shatakshi, has been a vocal advocate of her husband, and has spoken about the targeting that Rupesh has faced since 2019 for exploiting the violations of human rights faced by the Adivasis (tribals) in Jharkhand, some of which were state-sanctioned. Shatakshi worked against great odds to bring the truth before the public. In a recent interview, Ipsa spoke to Prajakta Joshi, Indie Journalist, about her husband’s arrest, life and the challenges she and their son have faced since.
Pajakta says, “For the last 11 months, nearly a year, I have spent speaking about Rupesh and his work. I understand the way and why Rupesh was arrested and I want people to know, become aware. The motive behind his arrest was to create fear in the minds of the people. …. in the so-called Naxal (dominated) areas, the CRPF personnel and also army officials deployed by the State stake claims on Adivasi lands; they behave oppressively, they want to silence the voices among Adivasis speaking up against insjustice and a denial of basic rights. This is happening in Jharkhand. Even when the army admits to have killed an innocent man in the false belief or pretext that he is a Naxalite, they face no consequences. Rupesh was targeted because he was bringing this reality to the forefront in Jharkhand.”
The arrest:
Ipsa also spoke about the last report that Rupesh Kumar had released before his arrest, about a girl who had been affected by pollution and had a tumour growing on her face.
Ipsa further spoke about how Rupesh Kumar was kept in jail for 6 months in this 2019 case and was released on default bail after 6 months, due to the non-filling of charge sheet. She also spoke how at least three more cases have been slapped on his after his July arrest last year.
Recalling the traumatic moments during the house search (read raid) that had happened in May, 2023, Ipsa said, “When the team reached our house, we first thought it would be the Patna police or the NIA team. The search kept on going for 10 hours, they were checking all the papers and books present in our house. It was only after the raid ended, when we asked them to show their paper, we got to know that the search team was from NIA, Ranchi. They did not tell me what the matter against Rupesh was in reference to Ranchi, but I know that, sooner than later, they will be putting another charge on some case and keeping him in jail.”
Ipsa told Prajakta that even during Rupesh’s interrogation, he had been told by the police in the current case that “they are not going to stop, they will not let him be released.”
Ipsa spoke about the frequent use of UAPA nowadays. Comparing it to how the school authorities would gift pens to their students to motivate them to excel, the state authorities are now charging people under UAPA to instil fear in their minds.
Challenges and anxieties that came with Rupesh’s arrest:
Ipsa spoke about the hard time that Rupesh Kumar had to face in jail too. She stated that during the beginning of his incarceration, he was kept with kept with other detainees who had serious ailments including Hepatitis, Tuberculosis, etc., and it was only after the outcry of the people outside that Rupesh’s jail was changed. But, as provided by Ipsa, they changed Rupesh’s jail only to keep him in isolation; the cell had a broken roof, which leaked when it rained. In addition to this, Rupesh was also being interrogated every day! Ipsa then provided that Rupesh went on a hunger strike for one day and wrote letters to the higher authorities to demand basic and dignified facilities to be made available to all the prisoners in jail.
Anxiety of detainees and families
In this interview, Ipsa also emphasised the anxiety the family of the incarcerated individuals face when they are not kept updated about their whereabouts, for example, when the person is shifted from one jail to another without any information or when the person is put in isolation. When Prajakta inquired about Pegasus, Ipsa spoke about the fear and confusion she had felt when she got to know that there were some talks about people being under surveillance. She also said that it all felt wrong to her, a violation of her privacy and rights, to be kept under surveillance without any knowledge or known fault.
Was UAPA necessary?
On the slapping of UAPA, and the continuous attempts to suppress the work done by Rupesh, Ipsa said that it feels as if both the Centre and the state are angry with him for speaking out against police brutality and the other state-sanctioned human rights violations going on in Jharkhand. She further said that all the political parties who have been governing India have only catered to the rich, and do not really care about the common man, and the same system has worsened under the governance of the BJP party.
Expressing her anger over the inclusion on UAPA charges in the causes against Rupesh, Ipsa said that people who are working for the welfare of the socially and economically backward and demanding are being termed as individuals working against the country, while people who are demanding for the declaration of India as a Hindu nation, which is against the secular essence enriched in our Constitution, are getting y-level security.
How free and tolerant is our democracy now?
The essential element of our democracy is tolerance, and the current party is not tolerating anything at all, Ipsa said. According to her, this raises the question whether it the activists and journalists who are performing “unlawful activities”, or is it the government that is performing the said unlawful activities?
Ipsa then mentions the recent statement released by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s White House state visit, wherein they have asked the United States government to urge the PM to end, what it called, “a crackdown on media” as it demanded the release of six journalists “arbitrarily detained in retaliation for their work”, which included journalist Rupesh Kumar Singh. In the said statement, CPJ stated that the journalists critical of the Indian government and the ruling BJP government have been jailed, harassed and surveilled. The other 5 journalist mentioned in the said statement were– Aasif Sultan, Sajad Gul, Fahad Shah, Irfan Mehraj and Gautam Navlakha.
The complete video can be viewed here:
Background on Rupesh Kumar Singh
On July 17, 2022, at 5:25 am on a Sunday morning, Saraikela Kharsawan district police conducted a 9-hour raid at the home of Journalist Rupesh Kumar Singh. They seized a bed sheet, a nine-page notebook, a tax invoice for a motorcycle, two mobile phones, one hard-disk, the retail invoice of a car and two laptops, among other personal items. Immediately following the raid, the police arrested Singh and charged him under the UAPA and sections of the Indian Penal Code.
Rupesh reports extensively on the rights of tribal communities, known as Adivasis, and other marginalised people for the news websites Janchowk and Media Vigil. Just before his arrest, on July 15, he published a thread on his Twitter account, where he has about 4,900 followers, on the impact of industrial and air pollution on the health of populations in Jharkhand villages.
Rupesh was arrested in connection with a 2021 case for his alleged links with leaders of the Communist Party of India (Maoist), including Prashant Bose. The police had claimed that the journalist was involved in organising funds for the Maoist members.
In the year 2019, Rupesh was associated with the student wing of the CPI (Leninist) during his time at college and was arrested for alleged links with Maoists by the police in the neighbouring state of Bihar. He had been detained for six months, and was released on bail after police did not file a chargesheet within 180 days as required by law.
It was purported then too that the journalist is being targeted for his investigative work surrounding human rights violations. Rupesh had believed that the security forces targeted him in retaliation for his reporting on the alleged extrajudicial killing of a tribal worker.
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