India’s Agony: 83-year-old Jesuit priest and activist for the poor and environment, Stan Swamy, still in jail

On 8 October 2020, 83-year-old Jesuit priest and activist Father Stan Swamy was arrested in India’s eastern state of Jharkhand by the country’s counter-terrorism task force, the National Investigation Agency (NIA), over a 2018 incident of caste-based violence, the Bhima Koregaon conspiracy case. This has made him the oldest person to be accused of terrorism in India.

If there were any doubts left in anyone’s mind about the increasing authoritarianism under the current dispensation in India and the extent it can go to crush dissent, they stood cleared in the wake of the arrest of the humble, courageous priest and veteran tribal rights activist, who spent six decades working for the poorest and most dispossessed and marginalised people in Jharkhand and Bihar states, both in eastern India.

Ironically, he has been labelled a Maoist and accused of being involved in a conspiracy to instigate caste violence by the government under the draconian Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act of 1967 (UAPA), even as he himself stands firmly against Maoism and has fought for those falsely incarcerated.

Stan Swamy is not some ordinary name and his arrest is far from ordinary. His biography of selfless work for people in the most difficult circumstances and terrains is inspiring and commendable. He has dedicated his life to working for the rights of Jharkhand’s Adivasi people, the term used for minority indigenous communities in India. 

His focus has been the dispossession and loss of livelihood of Adivasis, and their criminalisation in order to quell dissent against the oppressive policies of the government that facilitate land grabs by the state and corporates, as well as the unfettered exploitation of the natural resources in Jharkhand by corporates through mining, diversion of forests and land acquisition in the name of “development”.

Swamy has been a vocal opponent of the government’s anti-people and anti-environment policies and through his advocacy sought implementation in letter and spirit of the Fifth Schedule of the Indian Constitution. This provides for the administration of so-called scheduled areas and protection of the rights of scheduled tribes, and the Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996, (PESA) which affords Adivasi communities a degree of autonomy.

He publicly condemned the acquiring of land at throwaway prices and the bulldozing of standing crop by Indian multinational conglomerate company the Adani Group, considered a close friend of the governing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), for a power plant in the Jharkhand district of Godda, coal for which would be imported from Adani’s mines in Australia.

The Bhima Koregaon case was filed in connection with caste violence inflicted on members of India’s so-called lowest caste, the Dalits, by right-wing fundamentalists, while the former were visiting Bhima Koregaon on 1 January 2018 to commemorate the 200th year of the historic Bhima Koregaon battle between the British East India Company and the Peshwa faction of the Maratha Confederacy, which is seen as a landmark moment against caste oppression.

Instead of arresting the extremist Hindutva leaders Sambhaji Bhide and Milind Ekbote who instigated the violence against Dalits, the then BJP government in Maharashtra state turned the case into a conspiracy against the government, by targeting the Elgar Parishad event, which had been organised by 250 Dalit and Bahujan groups and civil society organisations a day before that, on 31 December 2017.

Swamy had no connection whatsoever with the Elgar Parishad event but, in what was considered a big challenge against the government, he had previously co-convened the Persecuted Prisoners Solidarity Committee with advocate Sudha Bharadwaj and filed a petition in the Jharkhand High Court for the release of more than 3,000 Adivasi and Dalit (India’s so-called lowest caste) youth who had been in jail for years for protesting against their illegal displacement and the violation of their rights.

It is for his advocacy efforts as a human rights and environmental defender that he is seen as an enemy by those in power. For example, in 2018, the then BJP-led Jharkhand government had filed a case against him in connection with the Adivasi movement for autonomy and restoration of land rights called the Pathalgadi movement. This is why they have put him away, implicating him in this fabricated case under grave terror charges.

Democracy has died a million deaths

Democracy has died a million deaths in India in the last few years. But Swamy’s arrest has stunned the political class and opposition in India. Possibly it has woken them up to the realisation that they could be next in line as the ruling party rages on to decimate its political opponents and destroy democracy and the Indian constitution.

In the words of the Chief Minister of Jharkhand, Hemant Soren, who said at a press conference following Swamy’s arrest; 

“Today it is the issue of Stan Swamy, tomorrow it will be your turn, then it will be our turn. Tomorrow it will be your state, today it is our state.”

As shocking as Swamy’s arrest has been for the nation’s conscience, it was imminent, with telltale signs since August 2018 when his house was first raided by police, at the time investigating the Bhima Koregaon case. In fact a few days before his arrest, anticipating it, he had recorded a video detailing the extent of interrogation faced by him over 15 hours and several sittings, as well as his activism in Jharkhand, which provoked this attack on him. 

The case itself has proved to be a set-up by the central government to incarcerate activists, lawyers, cultural artists and academics perceived as threats and most importantly, to create a chilling effect in civil society.

With the aid of a systematic vilification campaign aided by the state’s surveillance and police machinery and relying on fabrication of evidences, this case has been used to arrest defenders of human rights, in what is nothing short of a vendetta-driven casteist slap in the face of truth and justice.

So far 16 human rights defenders have been arrested in the case, of which five are senior citizens and Swamy the oldest.

Those arrested include three cultural activists of the Kabir Kala Manch cultural organisation formed in the city of Pune in 1992: Ramesh Gaichor, Sagar Gorkhe and Jyoti Jagtap; eminent poet Varavara Rao; thinker, writers and academics Anand Teltumbde, Gautam Navlakha, Shoma Sen and Hany Babu; lawyers Sudha Bharadwaj, Surendra Gadling, Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira, who are all also trade unionists, and activists Sudhir Dhawale, Mahesh Raut and Rona Wilson.

What compounds this attack is the use of terror legislation like UAPA and the sedition law to criminalise dissent and dissenters. Civil society groups and human rights advocates have been demanding repeal of these draconian laws. In 2019, in the middle of the Bhima Koregaon case, the government brought in amendment to the UAPA, giving the state unprecedented, unfettered discretionary powers to potentially designate any individual a terrorist on mere suspicion, without effective recourse and also giving powers to the NIA superseding those of the state police.

Upon displacement of the BJP government in Maharashtra in the state elections in November 2019, the central government ordered the NIA to take over the investigation from the state police immediately. Even as a challenge to the UAPA amendment is pending before the Supreme Court, the state machinery is in action using draconian provisions to silence dissent and punish its political and ideological enemies through the process itself.

While the majority of people incarcerated under UAPA are eventually acquitted, they end up being imprisoned for years without trial on false charges. No bail is granted owing to stringent requirements, and trials are invariably delayed.

In the Bhima Koregaon case, the trial has not even begun, even as the first five arrested activists are about to complete two-and-a-half years behind bars without their guilt being proven. Each time the trial is set to begin, a new set of arrests is made, delaying the trial and ensuring those arrested do not get bail. Interim bail on medical grounds has been consistently denied by the NIA court without considering factors like age and comorbidities, even as the Covid-19 pandemic continues to wreak havoc in the country.

Seventy-nine-year old Rao, who suffers from multiple health conditions, got infected with Covid-19 in jail and had to be hospitalised. He was not only denied bail but his challenge to the order of rejection has not been taken up for more than three months by the Bombay High Court.

Swamy’s bail application was rejected on 23 October 2020 by the NIA Court, in spite of his suffering from Parkinson’s and having a fall in jail. Living conditions and health risks in prison are a concern in light of the coronavirus pandemic. Requesting basic requirements like books and warm clothes are subject to gruelling processes and regular updates of even those who are ailing have been denied to family members.

An application filed last week by Swamy to be allowed to use a straw and sipper in jail since he is unable to hold a glass due to Parkinson’s has been kept 20 days later on 26 November 2020 as NIA has sought 20 days’ time to file a reply.  

The process itself has become the punishment, as it is intended to be.

Despite being behind bars, the spirit of Swamy is free. In a recent call from Taloja jail in Mumbai, where he is imprisoned, he sent a message to friends and well-wishers:

“I am languishing in prison for some alleged offences which I have not committed. If this is God’s will so be it. I hope truth will win and I will be released soon on bail.”

In the video before his arrest, Swamy had said he was ready to face whatever came his way for being a dissenting voice and for raising questions, since he was not a silent spectator.

His courageous words and commitment to human rights continue to inspire us. One can only hope that the voice demanding justice becomes louder and stronger and that he is released immediately. DM/MC

 Lara Jesani is an activist and lawyer based in Mumbai, India.