Free Binayak Sen

I don’t like wearing my conscience on my sleeves. But today I feel like doing it, thanks to Facebook, a networking site that I started hating recently.

I have been seeing Free ‘Dr.Binayak Sen’ campaigns as taglines of my friends for a long time. But I had never thought of asking these questions, ‘Who is Dr.Binayak Sen?’, ‘Why is he arrested?’ etc.

Today, I chanced upon the country singer, Susmit Bose’s Youtube posting on Dr.Binayak Sen. Let me tell you I was more interested to see Susmit Bose’ singing than the cause for which he was singing.

I googled to know more about Susmit Bose. The more I learnt about Bose, the more I felt the need to know about Dr.Binayak Sen. So I started googling Dr.Binayak Sen.

As all of you know by now, Dr.Binayak Sen is detained under the Chattisgarh Special Public Security Act by the Chattisgarh Government. Surprisingly, today (14th May 2009) marks the second anniversary of his detention.

Dr.Sen has been working amongst the poor people in Chattisgarh, giving them free medical help. The allegation against him is that he has been helping the Maoists (ultra leftists) who have been usurping the state government for long. Dr.Sen raised voice and attracted the attention of the responsible citizens all over the world about the state sponsored killing of poor tribal people, in the name of cleansing the area of ultras.

No substantial evidence is found against Dr.Sen for his alleged affiliations with the ultras. But he is still languishing in the state central prison. The High Court of the state and the Supreme Court of India have rejected his bail applications.

Why? Can’t the state correct itself if it has done something wrong, book the culprits in uniform for mindless killing and absolve Dr.Sen? Shouldn’t an egalitarian democracy like India be honoring a man of Dr.Sen’s worth with high accolades rather than keeping him jail and letting him rot at the sensitive age of fifty eight?

I join the millions of people, who voted or not in the last general elections, who demand the release of Dr.Sen. I demand this not because that I am a great radical or sensitive to everything that is going on around me, but because I know that the injustice being inflicted on Dr.Sen is nothing but injustice. I need not go into a case study with a skeptical mind in order to keep myself ‘objective’ in this matter.

Our egalitarian democracy has provisions for the criminals to contest in elections from jail and come out with state security for voting, and later for attending the policy meetings, denting the common exchequer.

A man who has helped poor people, however does not have these rights in our democracy. Who needs this kind of democracy?

Free Binayak Sen. That’s all.

A campaign is going on to change the facebook profile picture for a month with the ‘Free Binayak Sen poster’ in order to express solidarity with the millions who raise voice for freedom.

I humbly join them, faceless.