COMMITTEE FOR THE RELEASE OF POLITICAL PRISONERS
185/3, FOURTH FLOOR, ZAKIR NAGAR, NEW DELHI-110025
24/08/2013
Condemn the Arrest of Student and Cultural Activist Hem Mishra
by the Maharashtra Police!
Release Hem Mishra Unconditionally!
It was on the evening of 23rd
August that we at the CRPP received a call from a common friend about
the alleged arrest of Mr. Hem Mishra, a JNUite and cultural activist. It
was disclosed from an anonymous number to Mr. Shamsher Singh Bisht that
Hem Mishra has been arrested by the Gadchiroli police. Mr. Shamsher
Singh Bisht was told by the caller to inform Hem’s family. Apart from
this there was no information as to where he was arrested and in which
police station he was kept.
After a whole day’s effort through lawyers and journalist friends finally in the evening of the 24th the DIG Rajendra Kadam admitted to the media that Hem Mishra was arrested on the 23rd morning and was produced before the court on the 24th
evening to be remanded to police custody for 10 days. All these looks
clean. But when one digs deeper it is evident that Hem Mishra has been
incommunicado for the last four days or so. It is again self explanatory
that he has been picked up much earlier by the Maharashtra police and
has shown the arrest only on the 23rd to fit to the rule
book. The possibility of Hem being tortured in these days cannot be
ruled out given the track record of the police. While his friends and
lawyers were trying to trace down the whereabouts of Hem, the local
media was abuzz with the arrest of a Maoist/Naxalite with two alleged
couriers of a certain Narmada, a Maoist leader. Except a few diligent
journalists the media was taken in by the sensational news provided by
the police. As usual the police officials were soon to tell the media,
once they admitted his arrest, that they got incriminating stuff from
Hem. But beyond that hyperbole of a statement the same officials kept
mum on what this incriminating material that they had seized from him!
The police further claims Hem to be a courier for the Maoists from
Uttarakhand! And further to add meat to the story they claim that he was
arrested at a very sensitive place between Aheri and Etapally which is a
stronghold of the Maoists. Anyone who is conversant with the modus
operandi of the police in these regions or for that matter anywhere
given their illustrious record of impunity will vouch that the arrest
has happened somewhere else and it has been shown in this region
deliberately.
Given the sensation
driven reporting in a sizeable section of the media the natural
curiosity is that why Hem Mishra has in the first place been to this
area? Anyone who knows Hem Mishra—as testified by his friends—recalls a
person sensitive to the issues confronting the adivasis of Central and
Eastern India as well as someone who would find himself on the side of
the masses of the people. A cultural activist he has been active in JNU
and outside singing for the cause of the adivasis, against Operation
Green Hunt, against the increasing instances of impunity of the state.
He has been active in the student politics on JNU campus and elsewhere
as an activist of the Democratic Student’s Union. As an executive
member, Hem Mishra has also been part of the efforts of the CRPP to
provide legal aid and in the larger campaign for the release of the
political prisoners.
Given his sensitivity
to people’s issues, Hem has been an avid traveller often venturing into
different regions of the subcontinent that normally don’t attract
others. He has also been part of several fact finding missions to record
the plight of the people under the scourge of the fascist violence of
the state and other private business interests out to loot and plunder
the land and resources of the people. He was very impressed with the
work undertaken by Dr. Prakash Amte and his family in Gadchiroli and had
often expressed his wish to visit the place. Perhaps he also had this
wish to look for some alternate means of medication for the persisting
pain in his left hand after two complicated surgeries, albeit huge
financial difficulties, to get some relief for a physical disability.
The arrest and then framing up of Hem Mishra is a tell tale case of any
person in the subcontinent to find himself/herself at a potentially
“sensitive” place to be incriminated by the security/intelligence
agencies as per their whims. And it is difficult for any other common
sense to prevail where one can still refuse to accept the hysteria and
frenzy of the ideology of the so-called ‘war against terror’ and believe
with conviction that a person can still go to these places and s/he has
their right to not be incriminated or harassed. The lawlessness of the
law in these regions comes out in the ugliest fashion when someone from
the urban centre gets framed by the security agencies. Otherwise the
everyday life of the people in these regions has several such untold
stories to tell, abound with miseries.
The arrest and
framing of Hem Mishra is a step further from the security
forces/intelligence agencies to further trample on the rights of the
people who have been raising their voices against the worst kinds of
miseries they have been subjected to by the state and its forces in the
name of growth and development. Perhaps Gadchiroli is the only district
which is administered by no less than 40 plus IAS/IPS officers. All
claims of the state to bring the government and the administration to
the people have only resulted in more and more arrests, intimidation,
torture, rape and loot. The arrest of Hem shown at such a “sensitive”
area where the atrocities of the state on the people are the maximum is
also an indicator of things to come. Anyone who raises their voice in
support of the people in these regions will also be subjected to the
same treatment. Only a massive mobilisation of public opinion against
such vindictive and incriminating conduct of the state can push back
this grand design of the Indian State to build a Garrison State.
We strongly demand the unconditional release of Hem Mishra.
In Solidarity,
SAR Geelani
President
Amit Bhattacharyya
Secretary General
Rona Wilson
Secretary, Public Relations
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