Binayak Sen: Beyond the Case

There are three things I understand from the year long confinement of Binayak in Raipur jail.

The state seem to have become immune to any kind of non-violent protest and it does not care about the scathing attack it is subjected to by civil society groups, Nobel laureates, professionals, social activist, students…. It also does not care how its wily intentions are known to one and all, how, in normal course, it will not stand a chance in a court of law, and the possible ‘bad name’ the arrest of Binayak could bring to Chhattisgarh government.

What does this indicate? That it is time to look into the effectiveness of our strategies while seeking to amend the way governments function? That the forces which bring together and sustain the governments are so powerful and demanding that their support is what any government would go for, and would not go to any extent to keep them in good humour.

Secondly, having faced severe opposition by the people evicted for development projects in the recent past - sometimes successful, sometimes not, some turning violent, others not – the State needs a new strategy to evict people to the ever growing demands of the industries. Large-scale evictions for development projects and the subsequent actions by the State to ‘tackle’ the protestors have come for heavy criticism.

Maoism came handy for the Chhattisgarh government. ‘For their safety’ thousands and thousands of tribals were evicted from their natural resource rich villages and moved to police camps. The fate of a large number of them are unknown – may be they fled to other states. Companies have already started getting those lands. A few years later, in all likelihood, we will see a large number of industries and mining activities going on there. Forced evictions are getting more and more complicated to fight against.

Thirdly, it tested the capacity of the civil society, the media, judiciary and the international organisations to rally behind Binayak and to make an impact on the government. It brought together diverse groups together in India, a chain of programs were held in different countries, a prestigious award was given to Binayak, Nobel laureates were mobilised in support…. How much did it impact the government/s would be seen in the coming days.

However, Binayak’s is yet to become a symbolic case of the government curbing the civil and political rights of a large number of social activists / journalists and dealing with voices of dissent. One wish this to be a case to bring together a large number of people and organisations together to speak against the increasing violation of rights in the name of Maoism, terrorism, bomb blasts and national security.

Connecting with an earlier point, it could also be time for the social movements and civil society organisations to come together and re-strategise the way they want to engage with the State. May be, it is time to think about hitting the governments hard where it matters to them – electoral politics.