Ground Zero Blogs
by Himanshu Kumar
We want development
More cars, more shopping malls,
more commodities,
And for that, we need industry,
And for industry, we need minerals,
and for minerals, we need the land of Bastar,
and as long as Soni Sori resides there,
our development is impossible
So, we nabbed Soni Sori,
took her to the police station,
denuded her
tortured her with electric shocks.
Soni squirmed with extreme pain,
her eyes bulged out,
her whole body stiffened
She wanted to scream,
but even her mouth was without mercy,
ejecting foam, but no sound,
and then she reformed,
Soni was now prepared to not come in the way of India's development
My country's brave police,
our police,
our Government,
our development,
and since we are civilized, urbane and urban citizens of India,
we will never make the ugly mistake of talking about an uncivilized
adivasi like Soni Sori
We ask everyone to swear by their daughters
and let no one talk to us about Soni Sori
After all, this country's development is a serious matter
After Soni Sori is dead,
we will wax eloquent about grave matters.
Our essay on "How to end Naxalism in Bastar"
will argue forcefully about how
the Government can end Naxalism
through development
But don't you worry, we are not that hardhearted
Our thoughtful essay will also contain a few lines
on how to improve police conduct.
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Check out the murderous rage on his face! Check out the hand that has bludgeoned many heads! Check out the strained forehead that explain his years committed to bloodshed! |
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Ujjwal Kumar Singh, Professor of Political Science, Delhi University and I have just returned (January 1st) from a visit to the police state of Chhattisgarh. |
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Priyanka: I am a journalist and I need to speak to you about Sodi Sambo? Where is she now? Why was she illegal detained last night? |
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Witness and Supreme Court petitioner Sodhi Sambo recieving treatment for malaria at Dantewada hospital. She was apprehended by the police on her way to Delhi on the 3rd of January, 2010. |
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Interviews
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As you are aware, Soni Sori, an adivasi school teacher and warden from Chhattisgarh, is currently facing trial in Chhattisgarh. Accused as a Maoist supporter, despite evidence of her having being framed as one in several cases, she has been in custody in Chhattisgarh for about three and a half months.
What has been terribly shocking and perturbing is the fact that while in custody she has been subjected to gross sexual torture, evidence of which has come to light following a Supreme Court directive for medical examination in a government hospital in Kolkata. Compounding her crisis is the fact that despite this damning evidence, Soni Sori has remained in the custody of the Chhattisgarh police for all this while.
As the Supreme Court starts its hearing on her case on Monday 25th January, nearly 200 citizens including eminent citizens such as Professor (Retd) Uma Chakravarti, Ms Brinda Karat, Politburo Member CPI(M) and former MP Rajya Sabha, Ms Romila Thapar, Professor Emeritus, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi, Ms Aruna Roy, MKSS, Rajasthan, Ms Madhu Bhaduri, former Ambassador of India, Prof. Veena Shatrugna, retired Deputy Director, National Institute of Nutrition, Hyderabad, Dr Imrana Qadeer, Retd Professor, Ms Farah Naqvi, Activist, Ms Vasanth Kannabiran, Hyderabad, Ms Lalita Ramdas, Ms Githa Hariharan, Writer, Prof. Jayati Ghosh, Dr Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi, Dr Anand Phadke, Prof (Retd) Anand Chakravarti, along with scores of other doctors, educationists, academicians, students and individuals.
Also joining the appeal are 69 civil society groups and organisations working on women’s issues, health issues, civil and democratic rights, and worker’s issues from across the country, such as Saheli, WSS, AIDWA, AIPWA, NFIW, NAPM, NTUI, PUCL, FAOW, SAFHR, SAHAJ, SAHAYOG-UP, Zubaan Books, JADS, Nari Nirjatan Pratirodh Mancha and RTF-Rajasthan. Together they are urging the Supreme Court `to insulate this victim of custodial sexual assault from her oppressors, ensure her protection after she has spoken out about this torture despite threats to her person and family’, and send out a clear signal that `the rights of citizens will be protected, and that when the police abuses its powers, the judiciary will not stand by in silence’.
This appeal goes out with deep regard and faith that the Constitutional safeguards will be upheld and that justice will prevail.
Attached, please find The Open Letter To The Honourable Chief Justice Of India And Honourable Judges Of The Supreme Court Of India.
http://otherindia.org/dev/images/documents/sonisori/openlettertosupremecourt2.pdf |
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By Umang Kumar When I first heard of it, I did not believe it. Who does such things, I thought? And to a helpless woman, a teacher, a mother of three, at that? Several Hindi-Urdu words swirled in my head: kroorta (cruelty), barbarta (barbarism), jaahiliyat (also, barbarism). But when the medical report from Kolkata confirmed that “certain ‘foreign objects’” had been removed from Soni Sori’s private parts, the conjectures of wilful cruelty took shape. The bestiality and the depraved nature of the act became palpable. It was about stones, it was about bones, it was about hurt, it was about pain, it was about brutal and inhuman vengeance. Against a helpless woman in captivity. Ah, brave men of our security establishment who can so exercise their prowess over the weak and helpless. What sense of avenging they must feel, what sense of righteousness at the indignity they could inflict on a poor woman! But I write because the outrage over the punishment meted out to Soni Sori has been limited to few quarters. The press seems to have largely ignored the import of the findings of the medical report, especially with the Supreme Court having given the Chattisgarh government about two months, till Jan 23 2012 to get back on the findings of the report. The court was reportedly “anguished” by the report. I am sure it was. Anguish is just about the right emotion, I guess. However, quickly putting aside the anguish, it seems, it demonstrated extravagant understanding for the party on which the burden of the proof lies. It vouchsafed them enough time so they have a restful winter break, a joyous and extended new year celebration and a relaxed start to 2012 to eventually come back with some sort of response by the third week of January 2012. Really, where is the hurry? A poor and helpless tribal woman had some “foreign objects” taken out from her private parts; yes, there must have been a violation of the basest kind; yes, it must have caused the acutest of pain; yes, it must have been some form of torture; but justice is a slow turtle. Pains and aches and hurts can wait. Stones may have been inserted, but it is important that government machinery get enough time to go about its ways, everything through proper channel… Soni had earlier suffered injuries when she was transferred to a hospital in Dantewada, Chattisgarh soon after her arrest in Delhi allegedly for being a Maoist go-between. Her injuries were confirmed by the district hospital in Dantewada as “contusions on the right side of her head in the occipito pareital region…and tenderness in the lumbar region of the back.” The Chattisgarh police explained these as having been sustained from a fall in a bathroom. I try thinking what it must have been like to be so abused by the police, a helpless woman at that, but my mind shuts down; it does not want to imagine the horror which was visited upon Soni Sori, especially in the most recent case. It does not want to think of the crudeness of it all. The crude security personnel maybe masked to conceal their identity. Laughing demoniacally perhaps. Undressing her. Laughing all the time. And then the stones. Where did they get the stones from? And they deliberately chose the right sizes? How did they begin inserting them in her private parts? Did Soni scream, or did she bite-down the unbearable pain? And there must have been more laughing, more we’ll-teach-you-a-lesson-you-bitch gaalis…maybe she just passed out from the pain. What explains this sort of treatment at all? Why was this not national news, causing everybody in the country to sit up in anguish and horror and taking to the streets? Why did the Supreme Court not demand immediate explanation from the Chattisgarh government? Was the story of Soni’s abuse not incriminating enough, was the crime against her not vile enough to seek answers and apply justice right away? How much more abhorrent must a crime be for it to prompt an outrage? Or, maybe to put the question another way, what sort of impunity cloaks the powerful that they can hold justice in abeyance, almost at their will, almost on their terms? Or even, how insensitive and powerless have we all become? I am sure Soni knows full-well that justice cannot feel no anguish. To her, justice must seem cold and hard and inert like stone itself. And immensely hurtful. — Umang Kumar is an activist with the Free Binayak Sen campaign. |
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Monday, 5 December 2011 Letter to Supreme Court Judge via Lawyer - What was the police doing for one and a half years? If they had a warrant for one and a half years, why did they not arrest me? Now the police say that I was always absconding. If this was so, then why didn’t the police people inform the court that I was absconding so that the court could have issued a notice to my education department? On what basis did my education department give me my wages?
- Why does the police want to kill me? Even in the protection money case [note kaand], they fired on me on 11-9-2011. Only I know how I saved myself. After that a policeman himself tried to get me entangled in a false case by asking me to flee. I told these things even in the Saket Court. I cried and cried and tried to tell [the court] that the police had tortured me, even showed my earlier wound, and said that I will not go back from Delhi, I will carry on my fight in Delhi court. But even then the Court did not believe me and gave me to the Chhattisgarh police. I want to know from the Supreme Court who is responsible for my current condition? Court? Police? Administration? Government? Why did SP Ankit Garg and Mankar keep me in remand and torture me physically and mentally after so horrifically giving me electric shocks? Even if I want to, I cannot forget the internal wounds they gave me. If I was guilty, then they should have presented me at court after interrogation. Then the Court would have decided if I was to be punished or not. Judge Sahib, what sort of law is this that an innocent human being is being punished? What is my mistake?
- I believe that when Naxalites brutalize us or kill us, and we complain to the government, then the government would help us. But when the government’s people commit atrocities on us, where shall we go and complain? When the government’s functionaries tell us that you cannot complain anywhere because the government and the courts are all under us, tell me Judge Sahib, where can a woman made helpless by police brutality go?
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December 5, 2011 Save Soni Sori and prosecute the culpable Chattisgarh police for her torture An international coalition of more than 80 individuals and more than 25 organizations in India, the United States and Canada have issued a joint statement condemning the custodial torture of Soni Sori and have called for her release and demanded the prosecution of Chhattigarh police officials responsible for her torture. The complete statement is available at the following link: http://otherindia.org/dev/images/documents/sonisori/sonisori05122011.pdf For more information, contact the International Alliance for the Defense of Human Rights in India (IADHRI) by sending email to
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
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