Harassment of human rights activists is so often
part of their daily life that it goes unreported.
Detention or abduction, disappearances and
politically motivated imprisonment are used to
intimidate them.

A well-known activist of the People’s Union for
Civil Liberties (PUCL) and a medical doctor,
Binayak Sen, was arrested in May 2007 in
Chhattisgarh, under the provisions of the
controversial black laws, the Chhattisgarh
Special Public Security Act 2005 (CSPSA) and the
Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967,
amended in 2004 and made more stringent after the
collapse of POTA. In August 2007, Roma, a woman
activist working among the women, tribals and
Dalits of Mirz apur, Uttar Pradesh, under the
aegis of the Kaimur Kshetra Mahila Majdoor Kisan
Sangharsh Samiti and the National Forum of Forest
People and Forest Workers, was arrested and
charged under the National Security Act. A young
Oriya poet and literary editor, Saroj Mohanty,
who is also an activist of the Prakrutik Suraksha
Sampada Parishad, an organisation supporting the
struggles of the people of Kashipur, who for the
past 13 years have successfully opposed the entry
of large bauxite mining companies in the region,
was picked up by the police in July 2007 at
Rayagada, Orissa, on charges of dacoity, house
trespass and attempt to murder. Two activists -
Shamim and Anurag - of the Shramik Adivasi
Sanghathana and the Samajwadi Jan Parishad,
working amongst the tribals in the Betul, Harda
and Khandwa districts of Madhya Pradesh, were
served externment notices in June by the Harda
District Magistrate under the State Security Act.

Dr. Binayak, Roma, Saroj, Shamim, Anurag and many
like them are crucial actors of our present
times. They are individuals, groups of people or
organisations who promote and protect human
rights in many different ways and in different
capacities, through peaceful and non-violent
means. They uncover violations, subject them to
public scrutiny and press for those responsible
to be accountable. They empower individuals and
communities to claim their basic entitlements as
human beings. They represent some of the most
marginalised civil society groups - from the
tribal people to the landless rural workers and
women’s groups. However, because of their work
they face a range of challenges. They are
subjected to death threats and torture,
persecuted through the use of the judicial system
and silenced through the introduction of security
laws. Unfounded investigations and prosecutions,
surveillance of offices and homes, and the theft
of important human rights information and
documents are some of the tactics used to
intimidate them and prevent them from continuing
their work. Many even disappear or are murdered.
The pursuit of neo-liberal economic policies,
with its emphasis on special economic zones, land
acquisitions and appropriation of natural
resources, is intensifying the attacks on human
rights defenders.

This situation reminds us of the times when
cultural and trade union activists such as Safdar
Hashmi and Shankar Guha Niyogi were killed. The
bankruptcy and increasing isolation of the ruling
class provoke its local counterpart and they
launch a new offensive against the rights
activists. Yesterday, it was Safdar Hashmi and
Shankar Guha Niyogi, today it is Binayak Sen, and
tomorrow it will be Medha Patkar or Sunilam.

In fact, in spite of Indian democracy and India’s
membership of the Human Rights Council for the
second consecutive term, the situation in the
country is no different from global trends. In
her 2007 report, the Special Representative of
the U.N. Secretary General on the situation of
human rights defenders, noted that defenders
working on land rights, natural resources or
environmental issues seem to be particularly at
risk of attacks and violations of their rights:
"Defenders working [in the field of economic,
social and cultural rights] face violations of
their rights by the State and/or face violence
and threats from non-state actors because of
their work. Violations of their rights seem to
take all the forms that violations of the rights
of defenders working in the field of civil and
political rights take. There are some differences
though, perhaps the most important being that
defenders working in the field of ESCR often have
a harder time having their work accepted as human
rights work. This might have several effects,
including difficulties attracting funding, a lack
of coverage from the media to violations of these
defenders’ rights, and a lack of attention paid
to these violations and a hesitation in seeking
remedial measures at the domestic or
international levels." (Hina Jilani, Report
Submitted by the Special Representative, 24
January 2007)

Peoples’ rights agenda in India has always been a
dynamic and constantly evolving one, with
activists applying the principles and tools of
human rights to different contexts and struggles.
At different points in history, courageous and
visionary people have sought to extend the
boundaries of human rights to those outside, be
it those living amidst caste oppression, workers
unprotected against social insecurity, or women
denied any rights against violence. Thus we see
the emergence of new rights on information, food,
domestic violence, and tribal lands. People
forging new frontiers for rights are often the
ones most exposed to risk, ridicule and
resistance. The contours of human rights shift as
patterns of oppression change. Their scope and
content will therefore always be a matter of
contestation. Indeed, the human rights agenda has
always been built by its own critique. Those
excluded from the way rights are traditionally
understood or interpreted - for example, Dalits,
tribals, women, labour, homosexuals or the
disabled - are fighting for inclusion and
enriching and transforming the understanding of
human rights as a result.

There have always been challenges for human
rights and political activists in our country.
Harassment of activists is so often part of their
daily life that it goes unreported. Detention or
abduction, disappearances and politically
motivated imprisonment are used to stop
activists. In the recent past, smear campaigns
and defamatory tactics have also been used to
de-legitimise the works of defenders, with the
media often colluding in the dissemination of
slanderous accusations and attacks on their
personal integrity and political independence.

However, we are also now living in a new hostile
environment. As countless examples show, a large
area in the country is witnessing armed
conflicts, often on a massive scale, in which
civilian lives and livelihoods are increasingly
the principal casualty. It is in such an
environment that the work of human rights
activists is most needed, yet often least
respected. In an atmosphere of tense
polarisation, their impartiality is called into
question.

Further, new security measures introduced have
also had a chilling effect on the environment in
which rights activists operate. We have to
contend with the governmental discourse that
prioritises ’security’ (understood as prevention
of terrorism) over human rights, and that sees
the two as conflicting rather than mutually
supporting policy goals. In such circumstances,
human rights have come to be equated with ’being
soft on terrorism’ or concerned only with the
rights of suspected terrorists, rather than with
the victims of terrorism. The work of rights
activists has itself been equated with terrorism
or subversion in the eyes of some governments.

However, in the present phase of Indian polity,
human rights defenders, social justice movements
and development practitioners are more at the
receiving end when they take the language and
tools of rights into the sphere of economic and
social policy. On issues of land, water, forests
and mining, our government is hostile to the very
concept of economic and social rights as
enforceable entitlements. The experiences
involved in identifying violations, attributing
responsibility and proposing measures for redress
and prevention in these arenas lead us to also
view these rights as less enforceable through
legal means (’justiciable’).

In all the cases of attacks on human rights
defenders, there is a broader people’s resistance
and activists also fight their cases. However,
the main point is that the governments have the
obligation to protect human rights defenders as a
special category. In 1998, the U.N. adopted the
Declaration on Human Rights Defenders, which,
although not legally binding, draws together
provisions from other legally binding conventions
and covenants most relevant. The Declaration sets
out the prime responsibility of states to take
all necessary steps to ensure the protection of
all those who exercise their right to defend
human rights.

Among other things, the Declaration affirms the
rights: to defend human rights, to freedom of
association, to document human rights abuses, to
seek resources for human rights work, to
criticise the functioning of government bodies
and agencies and to access international
protection bodies. A Special Representative on
Human Rights Defenders was also appointed in
2000. Our national human rights institutions such
as the National Human Rights Commission should
take note of this fact for the protection of
human rights defenders. True, our rights
activists have many skills and years of honed
experience; there is no mystery or mystique to
defending human rights. We all hold the potential
of becoming human rights defenders.