RISE! RESIST! LIBERATE! REVOLUTIONARY DEMOCRATIC FRONT (RDF) Contact: revolutionarydemocracy@gmail 24 August 2013 Condemn the arbitrary arrest of cultural and student activist Hem Mishra by the Maharashtra State Police! Sometime between the 20th and the 23rd of August, Hem Mishra, a student of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) and a member of Democratic Students’ Union (DSU) was illegally arrested and detained by the Maharashtra State Police. He is in custody of the state police and the newspapers have reported that he has been remanded to police custody for ten days by the local magistrate. No information regarding his current whereabouts has been provided to his family and friends. His family heard about his arrest through local journalists who are trying to find out where he has been detained. Hem Mishra, a known cultural and student activist in Uttarakhand and Delhi has been working for the people by raising social issues since his early days in student activism. He is a physically disabled person and due to financial inabilities, he wished to visit the Lok Biradari Hospital run by Dr. Prakash Amte for free medical treatment in Bhamaragrh,according to his fellow students at JNU. At some point in his journey, it seems he was arrested and detained and has been out of touch with his friends and family since the 20th of August. Now, through news reports, it is revealed that he was arrested in Aheri, Maharashtra by the state police on Thursday night as a “prominent Naxal courier” along with two others. Further, a section of the media claims that he was produced before a magistrate on the 23rd of August, three days after he went missing. So far, no other information regarding his whereabouts, the arrest, and the charges have been disclosed by the state police in any public domain. In fact, another well-known newspaper report states that a senior Maharashtra state police officer has denied any knowledge of this arrest. Revolutionary Democratic Front strongly condemns this illegal and arbitrary arrest and detention of a cultural and student activist. RDF also condemns the refusal of the police to reveal where and on what charges he was arrested. This denial of information regarding his arrest and whereabouts is part of the practice of the police to illegally hold social activists for days without charging or producing them in court, criminally intimidate and torture the prisoner, and then fabricate false cases and finally malign the arrested persons using the media as a tool for spreading blatant lies. Hem is a well-known student leader and cultural activist. By branding him a ‘courier’ for Naxals, the police and the media intend to spread fear among young activists, threaten people’s leaders, and silence all voices of dissent. This illegal arrest of Hem, denying information to his family and finally producing him before a magistrate three days later clearly shows the impunity enjoyed by the Maharashtra state police to spread fear of custodial intimidation and possible torture of a known activist visiting for medical treatment. At a time when the case of the attack on students by ABVP goons in FTII, Pune for organizing an event inviting Kabir Kala Manch is making news all over the world, this arrest of another cultural activist exposes the true nature of the police and the state forces and their collusion with the reactionary forces of the country. The arbitrary and illegal arrests of activists like Jayeeta Das in West Bengal, the brutal killing of RDF’s Vice President Ganti Prasadam in Nellore in July, and the banning of RDF in Andhra Pradesh are all part of the undeclared war on people codenamed Operation Green Hunt taking on an urban avatar where activists, students and intellectuals are targeted for voicing the genuine demands of the people. RDF strongly and unequivocally condemns these arrests and detention of people’s activists on fabricated charges. RDF urges the revolutionary and democratic voices across the country to come together and protest this form of repression by the Maharashtra state police and the Indian state. President Varavara Rao 09676541715 GeneralSecretary Rajkishore 09717583539
Posted on: Sun, 25 Aug 2013 07:36:54 +0000
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