Friday, December 27, 2013

Fighting caste discrimination



Caste is one of India’s most enduring institutions and still retains its hold on Indian society. For those not fortunate to be born in the higher echelons of the caste hierarchy, life can be difficult indeed. Despite government efforts, caste discrimination is still rife, and low-caste Indians have to bear the brunt of poverty, illiteracy and violence. Lenin Raghuvanshi is in the forefront of the fight against caste discrimination, to ensure a just and equal society.

Raghuvanshi is the founder of the People’s Vigilance Committee on Human Rights (PVCHR), which fights for the rights of marginalized people in several North Indian states, especially in the area around Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh.

Raghuvanshi was born in an upper caste family, which he describes as “feudal”. He got a bachelor’s degree in ayurveda, modern medicine and surgery from the State Ayurvedic College in Haridwar. But the social inequities that faced India made him take up the cause of bonded labourers. This is when he noticed that not a single bonded labourer came from the upper caste, and realised that the problem was essentially caste.

In 1996, Raghuvanshi founded PVCHR to fight the caste system. He works to ensure basic rights to vulnerable groups like children, women, Dalits, tribes and minorities. Raghuvanshi and his team works at the grassroots level in Varanasi and around 200 villages in Uttar Pradesh and five other states. PVCHR works to eliminate situations that give rise to the exploitation of vulnerable and marginalized groups, and to start a movement for a people-friendly movement (Jan Mitra Samaj) through an inter-institutional approach.

Raghuvanshi has his task cut out for him since the lot of Dalits and other oppressed minorities continues to be dismal. “In the past, if anyone from the lower caste breached the unwritten law of caste hierarchy, the person would be beaten up in public. Now the person will be shot dead and the village burnt down and the women raped. A bridegroom riding a horse during his wedding, an enterprising peasant digging a well on his land, if a boy falls in love with a girl – do you kill them? Yet, if they belong to the Dalit caste they are killed. We still say that there is rule of law in India,” he said in his acceptance speech while receiving the Gwangju Prize for Human Rights.

He is also concerned about the plight of women and children in this country. “India is still very much a patriarchal and caste-based society with gender discrimination. The destructive effects of gender discrimination, patriarchal oppression and the semi-feudal society so prevalent in 21st century India are manifest in our 55 million children, employed at times in subhuman conditions,” he says in a newspaper interview.

Raghuvanshi received the Gwangju Human Rights Award in 2007. He was made an Ashoka Fellow in 2001 and was presented the International Human Rights Prize of the City of Weimar (Germany) in 2010. Raghuvanshi once said to a newspaper that caste discrimination is so rife in Bundelkhand that a Dalit has to take off his chappal and hold it in his hand if a person belonging to the Thakur caste approaches. It’s not something that would make us proud.
How can you Help?
Caste approaches is not something that would make us proud 



Contact details of the NGO/Institution

Name :  Lenin Raghuvanshi 
Email ID  lenin@pvchr.asia
Contact Number :  9935599333
Address  PVCHR Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh 

Sunday, December 22, 2013

Woman detained at police station during night



---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: PVCHR Communication <cfr.pvchr@gmail.com>
Date: Wed, Dec 18, 2013 at 1:43 PM
Subject: Woman detained at police station during night
To: covdnhrc <covdnhrc@nic.in>, jrlawnhrc <jrlawnhrc@hub.nic.in>
Cc: "Dr. Lenin Raghuvanshi" <lenin@pvchr.asia>


To,
The Chairperson
National Human Rights Commission
New Delhi
 
Dear Sir,
 
I want to bring in your kind attention towards the news published in Times of India on dated 14 December, 2013 regarding Woman detained at police station during night http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kochi/Woman-detained-at-police-station-during-night/articleshow/27316962.cms?intenttarget=no
 
Therefore it is a kind request please take appropriate action at earliest.
 
Thanking You
 
Sincerely Yours
 
Lenin Raghuvanshi
Secretary General
PVCHR

Woman detained at police station during night

TNN | Dec 14, 2013, 03.11 AM IST


KOCHI: The Kerala high court on Friday ordered that an FIR should be registered against a sub inspector of police for illegally detaining a woman at the police station all night and beating her.

A division bench comprising justices Antony Dominic and A V Ramakrishna Pillai ordered registering an FIR against Aranmula sub inspector Vinod Kumar after a woman produced before the court in a habeas corpus case informed the court that she was detained at the police station during night and slapped by the sub inspector.

The woman was produced at the high court by police on Friday morning as per the court's interim order on a habeas corpus petition filed by her mother. The mother's petition had said her daughter, who got married recently, had gone missing after she went with her husband to his brother's house at Palakkad on October 9.

Based on the court's interim order, the couple was located by police near Aranmula and was presented before the court on Friday morning.

During the hearing, the woman told the court about her plight and the court directed the police officer in charge of high court's security to come to the court along with a woman police constable. The police team was asked to record the woman's statement about the ill-treatment by the SI in writing. When the court commenced hearing in the afternoon, the police team submitted the recorded statement to the court.

After perusing the statement, the court said it specified non-bailable offences committed by the sub inspector. The court then issued an order to Pathanamthitta superintendent of police to register a case against the SI and asked the director general of police to provide an explanation regarding the incident.

According to section 160 of Criminal Procedure Code, no police officer should summon a woman to a police station as a witness. Police should record the statement of women witnesses at the place where they reside.

Even if a woman is accused of a crime and is to be arrested, it should be avoided between sunset and sunrise, according to guidelines on arrest issued by National Human Rights Commission.
 

Tuesday, December 17, 2013

Nearly 2,000 kids in jail with mothers, says NCRB


---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: PVCHR Communication <cfr.pvchr@gmail.com>
Date: Thu, Oct 3, 2013 at 11:52 AM
Subject: Nearly 2,000 kids in jail with mothers, says NCRB
To: covdnhrc <covdnhrc@nic.in>, jrlawnhrc <jrlawnhrc@hub.nic.in>
Cc: "Dr. Lenin Raghuvanshi" <lenin@pvchr.asia>


To,
The Chairperson
National Human Rights Commission
New Delhi
 
Dear Sir,
 
I want to bring in your kind attention towards the news published in Indian Express on 3rd October, 2013 regarding Nearly 2,000 kids in jail with mothers, says NCRB
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/nearly-2000-kids-in-jail-with-mothers-says-ncrb/1177444/

Nearly 2,000 kids in jail with mothers, says NCRB

VijaitaSingh : New Delhi, Thu Oct 03 2013, 02:46 hrsSmallLargePrint
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Prisons across the country were also home last year to nearly 2,000 children below the age of six years who were forced to live there with their mothers, the National Crime Records Bureau has found.
Although Supreme Court guidelines say they should be kept away from the barracks where their mothers are lodged, officials said it has not always been practical to do so.
The 2012 data compiled by the NCRB from 1,394 prisons in the country also shows that 1.2 per cent of inmates were suffering from mental illnesses.
The data shows 1,813 children were living with their mothers in prisons, with jails in Uttar Pradesh topping the list with 431, followed by West Bengal (220), Madhya Pradesh (163), Bihar (151) and Jharkhand (132).
"There are strict SC guidelines on how to deal with children of women inmates, both undertrials and convicts. We try not to keep the children with their mothers in the barracks but sometimes it is not possible as they are too small to be left alone," said IG (prisons), West Bengal, Ranvir Kumar.
"We then show some leniency and allow them in prisons at nights. We have to be considerate when it comes to children who are as young as an infant. West Bengal has a higher number as most of these women are from Bangladesh and have been arrested under the Foreigners Act for illegally crossing into the country," he said.
The NCRB also found that as many as 44,470 inmates had mental illnesses, with Orissa accounting for 496 cases, followed by Andhra Pradesh (443), Karnataka (383), Haryana (362) and Kerala (296).
"Although the jail manual says that mentally ill prisoners should be sent to asylums, it is not possible all the time as the degree of illness also varies. We try to keep such prisoners in separate wards and have convicts man their wards so that they do not inflict any injury on themselves. They are treated at the jail hospitals and there have been instances where such prisoners have recovered also," said a senior jail official.

Therefore it is kind request please take appropriate action
Thanking You
Sincerely Yours
Shruti Nagvanshi
Managing Trustee
&
Shirin Shabana Khan
Senior Manager
Peoples' Vigilance Committee on Human Rights
Mobile No. +91-9935599330

Dasna jailer brands inmate

-------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Pvchr <cfr.pvchr@gmail.com>
Date: Thu, Dec 12, 2013 at 6:44 PM
Subject: Dasna jailer brands inmate
To: covdnhrc@nic.in
Cc: jrlawnhrc@hub.nic.in, pvchr.adv@gmail.com


To,
The Chairperson
National Human Rights Commission
New Delhi

Dear Sir, 

I want to bring in your kind attention towards the news published in Times of India on12December,2013regardingDasna jailer brands inmate http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/noida/Dasna-jailer-brands-inmate/articleshow/27232425.cms

Therefore it is a kind request please take appropriate earliest. 

Thanking You

Sincerely Yours

Rohit Kumar
Detention Watch Co-ordinator
PVCHR

Dasna jailer brands inmate

Purusharth Aradhak,TNN | Dec 12, 2013, 04.22 AM IST
Dasna jailer brands inmate
The inmate has alleged that the deputy jailer brutally beat him up for not giving "extortion money" after which he branded his name on his back.
GHAZIABAD: A case of inhumanity has been reported from Dasna Jail with a deputy jailer being accused of branding his initials with a hot iron rod on the back of an inmate. The victim, Karan alias Chottu, a resident of Karawal Nagar in northeast Delhi, was lodged in jail two months ago on charges of murder. On Tuesday, when he was produced before the city court, he narrated his nightmarish experience.

The deputy jailer, Rajesh Kumar Pandey, allegedly brutally thrashed the inmate after which he reportedly sustained a fracture in the neck and leg. The victim's wife had gone to the jail to meet her husband last Friday and Sunday, but jail authorities did not allow her to meet him.

The wife has requested the court to conduct the inmate's medical examination to determine the atrocities done to him. The court has summoned Dasna jail superintendent for the next court hearing on December 12 to reply on the issue.

The inmate has alleged that the deputy jailer brutally beat him up for not giving "extortion money" after which he branded his name on his back. Counsel for Karan, S P Singh, on Tuesday moved an application in the court seeking strict action against Pandey. Singh has alleged in his application that Pandey had allegedly demanded Rs 60,000 from his client and forcefully extracted Rs 10,000 from his pocket on December 3.

When Karan pleaded that he could not give such big amount to him, Pandey threatened that if he failed to give Rs 50,000, he would face dire consequences. On December 4, Pandey, along with three other people, started beating him up. On December 5, Pandey beat Karan again and allegedly branded "RKP" on his back," the court application cited.

Friday, October 4, 2013

12 Madurai prisoners test HIV positive


---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: PVCHR Communication <cfr.pvchr@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, Oct 5, 2013 at 12:07 PM
Subject: 12 Madurai prisoners test HIV positive
To: covdnhrc <covdnhrc@nic.in>, jrlawnhrc <jrlawnhrc@hub.nic.in>
Cc: "Dr. Lenin Raghuvanshi" <lenin@pvchr.asia>


To,
The Chairperson
National Human Rights Commission
New Delhi
 
Dear Sir,
 
I want to bring in your kind attention towards the news published in Times of India on 5th October, 2013 regarding 12 Madurai prisoners test HIV positive http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/madurai/12-Madurai-prisoners-test-HIV-positive/articleshow/23552482.cms
 

12 Madurai prisoners test HIV positive

V Devanathan, TNN | Oct 5, 2013, 04.51 AM IST
MADURAI: In a shocking revelation, 12 inmates of the Madurai Central prison are found to have tested positive for HIV in the past few months. But, these inmates are left in the lurch due to lack of treatment.

There are about 1,700 inmates in the central prison. In the last six months alone, 12 new HIV positive inmates have been identified. Sources from the Tamil Nadu State Aids Control Society(TANSACS) allege that lack of cooperation and interest among the higher officials of the society and central prison has been hindering treatment for the inmates. Treatment for the newly-detected cases in the last six months could not be started due to this.

"As many as six inmates were found with HIV infection in April this year alone after undergoing the mandatory tests for new inmates of the prison. In May, no case was detected. However, six cases were detected between June and September. Since homosexual activity is rampant in the prison the inmates have high risk of getting infection. Detecting the HIV patients and providing required treatment for them is indispensable," said sources from the TANSACS.

Doctors say that testing the HIV patients at regular intervals is absolutely necessary. They should be brought to the anti-retroviral treatment (ART) on the premises of the Government Rajaji Hospitalfor treatment. They would be provided with medicines and kept in observation to analyse the patients' reaction to the medicine.

Sources from TANSACS said that they could not provide treatment for the HIV inmates since they are not brought to ART centres by the prison authorities. Citing inadequate police strength to escort the inmates to the centre, the officers refuse to send them for treatment. As a consequence, the inmates are deprived of proper treatment ending up in getting only regular tablets, they said. Moreover, TANSACS officials could not follow the HIV positive inmates when they are released on bail since majority of the prisoners' address available with the prison are found to be fake, the sources added.

When contacted, M Kalirajan, district programme manager for prevention and control of HIV-AIDS, Madurai said, "We are aware of the situation. We have taken up the issue to the notice of our project director a month ago. Action is yet to be taken. We have also suggested an alternative idea of sending ART specialists inside the prison to treat the patients."

K Anandan, superintendent of police, Madurai Central Prison when contacted said that they rely only on the city police to escort the HIV positive inmates to GRH. At times when the city police's strength is fully utilised for heavy security the inmates cannot be taken to the hospital. In such cases they would send paramedical staff to collect tables from the hospital, he said.

Therefore it is a kind request please take appropriate action at earliest.
 
 
Sincerely yours

Lenin Raghuvanshi
Secretary General 
Peoples' Vigilance Committee on Human Rights (PVCHR)
Sa 4/2 A Daulatpur, Varanasi
Mobile no. 09935599333

Tuesday, September 24, 2013

4,470 mentally challenged jail inmates in country in 2012: NCRB

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Pvchr <cfr.pvchr@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, Sep 21, 2013 at 11:57 AM
Subject: : 4,470 mentally challenged jail inmates in country in 2012: NCRB
To: covdnhrc@nic.in
Cc: jrlawnhrc@hub.nic.in, Lenin Raghuvanshi <lenin@pvchr.asia>

To, 
     The Chairperson 
The National Human Rights Commission
New Delhi

Dear Sir, 

I want to bring in your kind attention towards the news published in the Hindu regarding 

4,470 mentally challenged jail inmates in country in 2012: NCRB on 20 September, 2013 http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/4470-mentally-challenged-jail-inmates-in-country-in-2012-ncrb/article5150162.ece


Therefore it is a kind request please take appropriate action at earliest. 

Lenin Raghuvanshi 
Secretary General 
People's, Vigilance Committee on Human Rights 
mobile no. 9935599333

4,470 mentally challenged jail inmates in country in 2012: NCRB

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An attender takes mentally challenged person into the high-security psychiatric ward. The NCRB statistics show that 4,470 of the jail inmates were mentally challenged persons accounting for 1.2 per cent of the total. File photo
The HinduAn attender takes mentally challenged person into the high-security psychiatric ward. The NCRB statistics show that 4,470 of the jail inmates were mentally challenged persons accounting for 1.2 per cent of the total. File photo
Prison statistics of the country for the year 2012 released by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) last week show that 3,85,135 persons were lodged in the 1,394 jails of the country as on December 31 last, the date considered by the NCRB for tabulating the annual statistics. 95.6 per cent or 3,68,184 of the inmates were male and remaining 4.4 per cent female. During that year another 2,20,542 inmates were released on various grounds.
The statistics show that 4,470 of the inmates were mentally challenged persons accounting for 1.2 per cent of the total. They include convicts, undertials and detenues. Odisha had the highest number of mentally challenged inmates with 496 followed by Andhra Pradesh with 443 inmates, West Bengal with 417 and Karnataka with 383. In fact all the 28 States had mentally challenged inmates in its jails last year. The Union Territory of Delhi had 120 such inmates.
The total inmates last year comprise 1,27,789 convicts, 2,54,857 undertrials, 1,922 detenues plus 567 inmates marked as “others”. They include 6,592 foreign nationals. Uttar Pradesh topped the list with 80,311 inmates. Madhya Pradesh which followed had less than half the figure of UP-33,959 inmates and Bihar third with 28,550. In 2011 too UP was on top with 82,383 inmates.
From among the convicts, 64,949 accounted for murder alone. With 11,417 inmates, UP had the highest number of such convicts in its jails last year and also accounted to the highest percentage of murder convicts in the country during the year-17.6, followed by Madhya Pradesh with 10,414 inmates or 16 per cent. The jails had 7,009 inmates convicted for rape.
Though 414 inmates, including 13 women, in various jails of the country were those serving capital punishment only one execution had taken place and that was in Maharashtra. The person executed was the Pakistani national Ajmal Kasab who was given the noose for his involvement in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks. Kasab was executed at the Yerwada prison, Pune on November 21, last year.
UP had the highest number of inmates serving capital punishment-106 and all of them men. Karnataka had 63 such inmates including a woman and Maharashtra had 46 including five women. Delhi had 27 and four among them were women. Last year alone 97 persons were sentenced to death in the country with UP accounting for 25. In 2011, there were 477 convicts served capital punishment in various jails but no executions were carried out that year.
Last year 1,471 inmates had died at various jails in the country and they included 55 women. 1,345 of these deaths were termed natural and remaining 126 listed as un-natural. The latter category includes 87 suicides inside jails and 8 of them women. Punjab accounted for the highest number of suicides-17 followed by Uttar Prdesh with 10.
1,580 inmates were post graduates. The jails provided vocational training to 52,228 prisoners. The highest gross earning through production of goods by inmates trained in various vocational programmes was reported from Delhi-Rs. 28.85 crore, followed by Bihar-Rs. 17.08 crore, UP-Rs. 14.56 crore and Kerala-Rs. 12.55 crore.
382 children of 344 women convicts and 1,397 children of 1,226 women undertrials were also lodged in the various jails of the country along with the mothers.