[Reader-list] Fwd: Fwd: pudr statement on chhatisgarh incidents

[Asit Das]

this is the formal reply from theb  indian state

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Lalit Ambardar <lalitambardar at hotmail.com>
Date: Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 12:44 AM
Subject: RE: [Reader-list] Fwd: pudr statement on chhatisgarh incidents
To: Asit Das <asit1917 at gmail.com>, "reader-list at sarai.net" <
reader-list at sarai.net>


The Maoists, the proponents of  "Power flows through the barrel of the gun"
doctrine  at terror war against the Indian state with the sole aim of
capturing power deserve no mercy, certainly not the privileges under  'laws
of war'.

Terrorism is a military problem deserving military solutions only.
....LA
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------



> Date: Tue, 4 Jun 2013 05:09:08 -0700
> From: asit1917 at gmail.com
> To: reader-list at sarai.net
> Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: pudr statement on chhatisgarh incidents

>
> PUDR Statement on the unending spiral of violence in
> Chhattisgarh<http://sanhati.com/articles/7118/>
>
> *June 1, 2013*
>
> The People’s Union for Democratic Rights (PUDR) notes with concern the sad
> loss of 30 lives in the Maoist attack on the “Parivartan Rally” of
Congress
> Party on 25 May 2013. This is the latest in the series of killings, big
and
> small, in the ongoing undeclared war that the Indian government is waging
> against our own people. Many of the victims of this war are poor adivasis
> killed in operations by the security forces, that the government
> assiduously attempts to hide from the public at large. But, as in the
> present instance, ruling party functionaries, security forces personnel
and
> Maoist cadres have also lost their lives.
>
> Since 2005, the PUDR and a number of civil liberties organizations have
> been consistently alerting the public to this escalating war against the
> poorest of our citizens. Between May 2012 and May 2013 there has been a
six
> to eight times increase in the number of security forces operations being
> carried out in the Bastar division of Chhattisgarh. In every district no
> less than 10-15 operations were already being carried out each month.
These
> are being conducted away from the prying eye of the media and civil
> liberties activists and civilian access to these areas is severely
> curtailed. On 17 May, ten days before the attack on Congress leaders, nine
> persons including three children were killed by the security forces in the
> village of Ehadesmeta.
>
> While PUDR sees the killing of two people who were taken into custody in
> this instance as an act that cannot be justified and against the rules of
> war, there is a need to speak out about the role of parties such as
> Congress and BJP in launching Salwa Judum, which was designed to terrorise
> the adivasis of Bastar. Congress leaders like Mahendra Karma, the BJP led
> Chhattisgarh government and the UPA government patronized this murderous
> enterprise until it was declared illegal by the Supreme Court of India.
> While Salwa Judum may have formally ended, the elements which comprised
the
> SJ including its leaders and handlers in the security establishment were
> either incorporated in the ongoing operations as regular forces or some of
> them chose to switch from being ‘hunters’ to ‘running with the hares’ with
> impending state assembly elections due in November. In any case, every
> attempt to prosecute those guilty of the heinous crimes had been
frustrated
> by the governments in power. So the carnage that took place on 26 May was
> something, unfortunately, waiting to happen.
>
> The governments have plainly connected the continuation of the ongoing war
> with the prospects of growth in national income. None other than Indian
> Prime Minister Manmohan Singh declared Maoists to be the single biggest
> internal security threat in 2006. Speaking to IPS probationers on 24th
> December 2010, he also explained the reason for the war: “Naxalism today
> afflicts the Central India parts where the bulk of India’s mineral wealth
> lies and if we don’t control Naxalism we have to say goodbye to our
> country’s ambitions to sustain growth rate of 10-11 per cent per annum.”
>
> All doubts were laid to rest when government actions confirmed the verbal
> declarations. In Saranda forest of Jharkhand, once the Maoists were forced
> to pull back, the Forest Advisory Committee of the Ministry of Environment
> and Forests began clearing proposals of mining corporations to take over
> forests for non-forest use. It led Minister for Rural Development, Jairam
> Ramesh, to complain on 7 February 2013 that “I have been at great pains to
> counter Maoist propaganda that the Saranda Development Project is a ploy
to
> benefit private mining interests. This Forest Advisory Committee decision
> is a huge setback and very retrograde” (8 February 2013, Indian Express,
> Delhi). The Union Tribal Affairs Minister Kishore Chandra Deo complained
to
> Hindustan Times (17 May 2013) that “my permission [is] not required nor my
> opinion is sought in matters relating to tribals. My voice goes unheard”.
>
> On the other hand, legislations and constitutional provisions meant to
> safeguard tribals are being thrown to the winds. The fate of the Forest
> Rights Act (FRA), the showpiece legislation of UPA-I, ostensibly
> promulgated for empowering forest dwellers, is a case in point. Quite
apart
> from its poor implementation, the core issue of Gram Sabha’s “consent” for
> non-tribal use of tribal land has been diluted not just in the name of
> “linear projects”, but in the Congress-ruled Andhra Pradesh the government
> has concluded that under the FRA, Gram Sabha consent is required only to
> permit mining of minor minerals whereas major minerals such as bauxite and
> iron ore etc are outside their jurisdiction. Supreme Court’s latest order
> on Niyamgiri Hills narrows down the jurisdiction of Gram Sabhas by
reducing
> and restricting the definition of impacted area to a radius of ten
> kilometers, when it is a known fact that livelihood and lives are affected
> across a much larger area.
>
> It is this continued attack on lives and livelihood of people, threat of
> displacement from forest areas, dilution of FRA, PESA and complete
> indifference to Sixth Schedule compounded by the increasing restrictions
on
> public protests, arbitrary laws to prosecute those who oppose their
> dispossession and bans on political opinion that is responsible for the
> civil unrest that pervades our society. It is this government that places
> the requirements of Foreign Direct Investment above the needs of our own
> people, and which attempts to ram down this “development model” with the
> barrel of a gun, that is at fault.
>
> As the war is being scaled up it is also turning ugly. PUDR, therefore,
> urges all people to bring pressure on the ruling parties at the Centre and
> the nine state governments currently carrying out this war, to de-escalate
> the militarisation of this region and show a commitment towards dialogue.
> We hope that the deaths of 30 persons in the present instance and of
> hundreds of people in the past eight years are sufficient reason for
people
> to recognize the absurdity of this war.
>
> In the meantime, we ask the Government of India to shed its policy of
> deniability and accept that it is engaged in an internal war. And we ask
> both sides to abide by the rules that govern war by declaring its
> commitment to common article 3 of Geneva Convention and Protocol II, which
> applies to non-international armed conflict.
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