Binayak Sen, a well-known human
rights defender and paediatrician, who was detained for two years since 2007,
has finally been granted bail. Many human rights organisations, including
FORUM-ASIA members, expressed concerns over the case. The Release Binayak Campaign launched on 26 March 2009 expressed
that this is the "first sweet victory in a much bitter battle ahead",
because the charges against him are not withdrawn.
Binayak Sen, a well-known human
rights defender and paediatrician, who was detained for two years since 2007,
has finally been granted bail. Many human rights organisations, including
FORUM-ASIA members, expressed concerns over the case.
The Release Binayak Campaign launched on 26 March 2009 expressed
that this is the "first sweet victory in a much bitter battle ahead",
because the charges against him are not withdrawn. Below is the campaign's message.
"Bail granted" – the magical
words rung through the crowded supreme court chamber with the full
power of an ace footballer's match clinching shot to the goal.
It took just 30 seconds for Justice
Markandeya Katju to dispel what the dark forces of Indian politics,
bureaucracy and so-called "internal security" had wrought against the
good doctor over the past two years.
"I am aware of the facts of the case. He has been already in jail for two years",
said the honourable justice, presiding over Dr. Sen's application for
bail before the Indian Supreme Court, refusing to hear the
prosecution's arguments. There was no ambiguity in his judgment at all
– two years was indeed too much!
It was a small step for the Indian
justice system perhaps, but a big leap for Binayak languishing in
Raipur jail for what seems ages now – not just arrested on false charges
but denied the basic right to bail for so long.
For the thousands of friends,
supporters and well-wishers of Dr. Sen in India and around the world the
Supreme Court's verdict of 25 May has come like fresh drops of rain in what seemed like a wasteland of injustice.
Their various contributions for Dr.
Sen's release – small, big, medium – have all added up to precipitate
those drops from what seemed to be an unyielding climate of oppression
created by the Indian state's bogus "war on terrorism". A war in which
there are no rules, no norms of decency and no inalienable rights of
citizens who come in the crossfire between an extremist state and its
extremist foes.
It is testimony to the sheer respect
and love that Dr. Sen has earned from so many that the campaign for his
release has persisted over the past two years without ever giving up.
There have been times of course when its morale may have sagged a bit
but this was always amply made up for by the repeated surge of
struggles all around the world, which have made this campaign
unprecedented in the annals of the Indian civil rights movement.
The granting of bail is the first sweet
victory in a much bitter battle ahead – a battle that will need all the
creative energies, enthusiasm and motivation that has sustained the
campaign so far. We need to see this story to its only possible end –
the complete withdrawal of the false charges foisted on Dr. Sen or his
acquittal by the Indian courts of these charges and – may we demand
– even compensation for the injustice done to him.
