Hungry for justice in India

By Sudha Ramachandran *

Indian authorities this month released and then re-arrested political activist Irom Sharmila for attempting to commit suicide - it was the sixteenth time in the past decade. Sharmila's is no ordinary suicide attempt. She has been on hunger strike for almost 10 years, protesting a draconian piece of legislation, the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), that is in effect in parts of India's northeast. Not a morsel of food has passed through her mouth since November 2000.

Pitted against the physically frail but steely Sharmila is the mighty Indian state, ever willing to use force to ensure India's territorial integrity. Sharmila is no secessionist, she simply demands that the Indian state repeal the AFSPA. The AFSPA gives India's armed forces the power to shoot-at-sight and arrest without a warrant. It empowers even non-commissioned officers or jawans to shoot to kill on the basis of mere suspicion, as well as the right to destroy property where suspects are thought to be hiding.

The act provides the armed forces with legal immunity. Section 6 saying, "no prosecution, suit or other legal proceeding shall be instituted ... against any person in respect of anything done or purported to be done in exercise of the powers conferred by this act". The anti-AFSPA movement say the act has enabled the armed forces to engage in gross human-rights violations in the northeast and Jammu and Kashmir, in the name of fighting insurgencies. They say it is a virtual license to kill.

Sharmila's epic fast-unto death began on November 4, 2000, three days after 10 people were gunned down near Imphal in Manipur by the Assam Rifles, a paramilitary force engaged in counter-insurgency operations in the strife-torn northeast. Sharmila was a witness. The army has since kept her alive by feeding her through a painful nasal drip.

Fasting-unto-death as a strategy of peaceful protest was used by Mahatma Gandhi to end British colonial rule - India gained its independence in 1947. The strategy continues to be used by Indian politicians and activists. But skeptics say that the "hunger strike" most Indian politicians take on begins after a hearty breakfast and is broken before dinner. More often than not, the government concedes to their demands.

This is not the case with Sharmila - the government shows no signs of relenting. Though she says it is not her intention to die, her hunger strike has been declared an "attempted suicide" - a crime. Under Indian law, attempted suicide carries a maximum punishment of one year in jail. Consequently, she is held in judicial custody for a year and released, after which she is re-arrested within a day.

This ritual of arresting, releasing and re-arresting Sharmila has been going on for the past decade. This year, the ritual was enacted for the sixteenth time. Sharmila was freed from judicial custody on Monday and re-arrested on Wednesday. Now she is back on her nasal drip in a prison hospital.

Sharmila is not alone in her protest. The campaign against the AFSPA is spearheaded by the Abunba Lup, an umbrella grouping of around 32 organizations, the Meira Paibi - a grassroots movement of tens of thousands of Manipuri village women - and rights activists. The overwhelming majority of the people in the northeast and the state of Jammu and Kashmir want to see the act repealed.

Modeled on the Armed Forces Special Powers Ordinance that was promulgated by the British colonial government on 15 August 1942 to suppress the Quit India Movement, the AFSPA was enacted by the Indian Parliament in September 1958 to tackle the insurgency in "disturbed areas" of the northeast. It was supposed to be in operation for a year but almost 52 years on, the AFSPA is still in effect in "disturbed areas" across all seven northeastern states. All of Manipur came under the AFSPA in 1980. The legislation was extended to Jammu and Kashmir in July 1990.

The protest movement against the AFSPA is several decades old now. In July 2004, 12 Imas (mothers) of the Meira Paibi movement stripped in front of the Kangla Fort, then headquarters of the Assam Rifles, hoping to draw international attention to alleged atrocities being carried out by the Indian armed forces in the northeast.

"Indian Army come and rape us all," shouted the 12 naked women outside the Kangla Fort gate, protesting the alleged rape and subsequent killing of the 32-year-old Thangjam Manorama Devi by personnel of the Assam Rifles. They demanded that AFSPA be repealed.

Since July last year Manipur has seen mass protests after 28-year-old Chongkham Sanjit was shot dead by an armed detachment of Manipur's Rapid Action Police Force. The killing was captured on camera, in what is known in India as a "fake encounter" killing - a staged shootout.

Rights groups say the AFSPA violates the basic tenets of India's criminal justice system as well as individual rights guaranteed under Indian and international law. Human Rights Watch has described it as a "tool of state abuse, oppression and discrimination".

But the military says the law is necessary. "The armed forces are called in when the law-and-order situation is beyond the control of local law enforcement authorities. It is natural for the armed forces to expect protection from prosecution when they operate in these circumstances," said Lieutenant General (retired) V K Nayar, former governor of Manipur and Nagaland.

Defense Minister A K Antony has said that the armed forces "cannot function without special powers". There is little evidence to suggest that the AFSPA has helped quell the insurgency in northeast India. Fifty-eight years after its was enacted, the areas where the AFSPA is needed have only expanded. There were four insurgent groups active in Manipur in 1980 when AFSPA was imposed, today there are some 24 groups in the area.

After the furor over the killing of Manorama Devi, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh promised Manipuri activists that "a more humane act" would be put in place. He set up the Justice B P Jeevan Reddy Committee to review the AFSPA - it recommended that the act be repealed. "The act, for whatever reason, has become a symbol of oppression, an object of hate and an instrument of discrimination and high-handedness," said the committee, which felt that tackling insurgency and terrorism could be better met by changing to the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967.

The government has neither accepted nor rejected the report. It has been silent. And AFSPA remains in force. Observers say that while government has conceded to the demands of politicians who use hunger strikes as blackmail, it is refusing to heed the call of activists like Sharmila who articulate their demands quite differently. Officials say the government is working on amending the AFSPA. But half-measures are unlikely to satisfy Sharmila or the people of Manipur and other "disturbed areas".