Protest demonstration and Cultural/Musical program outside Patiyala Court, Delhi to call for AFSPA withdrawal

22 May 2013 *

North-East Forum for International Solidarity (NEFIS) along with a number of progressive individuals today held a protest demonstration and participated in cultural/musical program outside Patiyala Court, New Delhi to call for the withdrawal of AFSPA and the end of military occupation in the ‘north-east’ and Kashmir.

The protest demonstration was supposed to synchronize with the court appearance of Irom Sharmila but the date was postponed to 30th May. NEFIS decided to go ahead with the protest demonstration nonetheless, and it also resolved to turn up for a bigger protest on 30th May when the hearing of Sharmila happens in the court.

Yours sincerely,

Chinglen Khumukcham
Thanglunmang Khongsai
NEFIS
North-east Forum For International Solidarity
Correspondence address: 7/24 Double Story Vijay Nagar, Delhi-110007
Email id: [email protected]


Scrap AFSPA! Wage a United Struggle against Military Occupation!!
Unity of Oppressed Nationalities and Communities Long Live!!


Friends,

For twelve long years Irom Sharmila has been on a hunger strike to demand a simple thing that the Indian State must enforce its own constitution by abrogating the inhuman AFSPA law but the Indian state continues to behave as though neither Sharmila’s struggle nor the plight of the millions of people in the ‘north-east’ and Kashmir exist. It is a tragic coincidence that this same day, 22nd May, 1958 AFSPA law was promulgated for the first time by the Indian state, and today again on the same day, by sentencing Sharmila, the Indian state would reveal its true face.

By denying us the right to rule of law the Indian state has kept us relegated to the status of second class citizens in the country that claims itself to be the world’s largest democracy. The fact that AFSPA law is a mutation of the Armed Forces Special Powers Ordinance promulgated by the British government on August 15 1942 to suppress the Quit India Movement proves that the attitude of the Indian State towards the areas where AFSPA is in force is similar to the attitude that the British Raj had toward its colonies.

For the people of the areas where this law is in existence, democracy does not exist, for all practical purposes we have been living under the state of undeclared public emergency. Indian ‘nationalists’ love to look across the border and gleefully compare the virtues of their parliamentary democracy with the succession of military juntas that have ruled over Pakistan through most of its post-independence history. And yet, they never notice that they themselves have consigned such vast areas of their country to military rule. Perhaps it would not be wrong to say that in India the idea of democracy has been completely hollowed out of its genuineness and come to denote hypocrisy.

Military occupation, draconian laws like AFSPA, rapes, murders disappearances do exist in a democratic state. The bogey of counter-insurgency wears thinner by day as ever new evidences of the atrocities committed by the occupying military come to light. Even the Indian State is finding it increasingly difficult hide behind its lies and propaganda. Declarations of the committee appointed by the Supreme Court in April 2013 that fake encounters happened in Manipur merely affirmed facts that we have all known for very long. This along with the arrest of a Lieutenant Colonel along with six others in March 2013 while smuggling drugs exposed the extent of degeneration and corruption within the Indian army. There is less justification than ever before to allow such sweeping powers to an army that has such low credibility.

Now more than ever before we need to come together and unite to overthrow the tyranny of military occupation. But a question that we need to ask ourselves repeatedly is whether we can accomplish this task in isolation from other communities that face similar predicament? The cause of Tamils of Sri Lanka, millions of whom have perished in the assault of the Sinhalese forces, the Afghans and the Iraqis who face American drone attacks daily, the cause of the Kashmiris and the cause of our brethren of the ‘north-east’ cutting across all communities, all of these are very much our own! Isolated we are insignificant, united we would become a formidable force that no state, army or border would be able to stop. Let no people be oppressed by military occupation! Let’s unite against military occupation and tyranny across communities and borders!! Towards Freedom and International Solidarity!!

NORTH-EAST FORUM FOR INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY (NEFIS)
Email id: [email protected]