New Delhi: A group of 146 scholars from across the world, including Noam Chomsky, Christophe Jaffrelot and Ania Loomba, have come together to ask for the immediate release of 80-year-old Telugu poet and activist Varavara Rao.
Rao, who has been arrested in connection with the Bhima Koregaon violence in 2018, had recently tested positive for Covid-19. He was undergoing treatment at the state-run St George Hospital in south Mumbai before being shifted to the Nanavati Hospital Sunday for neurological and urological treatment.
Signatories of the statement include English economist Barbara Harris-White; Hugo Gorringe, co-director at the Centre for South Asian Studies, University of Edinburgh; Gyanendra Pandey, professor of history at the Emory University in Atlanta; political scientist Jaffrelot and Loomba, a Catherine Bryson professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania, among others.
“Varavara Rao, poet, writer, activist and long-time speaker of truth to power has been imprisoned for two years now, along with 10 other scholar-activists. They have been charged with inciting violence in Bhima Koregaon, a charge widely regarded as false, and over the past two years the government has failed to bring the charges to court and start the trial,” the statement reads.
Rao’s condition, the statement further says, suggests a “clear neglect of his health by the authorities”. The scholars have also demanded the release of other Elgar Parishad activists.
“Conditions of the jails in which these prisoners of conscience have been kept are said to be unhealthy and the threat of spread of infection has grown. Mr Rao, who is 80 years old, has now tested positive for Covid-19 and is seriously ill with several comorbidities.
“His condition suggests clear neglect of his health by the authorities. We join other international scholars in appealing for the immediate release of Varavara Rao and the other Elgar Parishad activists,” read the statement.
Last week, 50 poets from across the country had also released a public statement asking for Rao’s immediate release.
Also read: With no new evidence, NIA relies on Pune police case to oppose bail to Bhima-Koregaon accused
Rao tested Covid positive last week
Rao was shifted from the Taloja Central Jail to the JJ Hospital in south Mumbai early last week after he complained of dizziness and subsequently tested positive for Covid-19 on 16 July.
Prior to this, the Telugu poet had moved the Bombay High Court after his plea for interim bail on medical grounds was rejected by a special NIA court.
Along with Rao, nine other activists were arrested in relation to the Bhima Koregaon violence. All cases were transferred to the NIA earlier this year.
Also read: ‘350 inmates in 6 rooms, only 3 toilets’: Letter describes Gautam Navlakha’s jail in Raigad
It is all the more necessary to keep him in prison now.
Similar strategies are used to release Nandini the convicted criminal in Rajeev Gandhi murder case. Here it is left “ liberals” and there divisive dravida crowd. Law should take its own course, the usual cliche.
Do you know anything about the other signature campaign that has over 5000 signatures? The signature campaign to keep Rao, Bhardwaj and others who are charged with plotting to break up India, encourage violence. Many policemen, revenue officers, small shopkeepers, school teachers, bus crew, truck drivers, tribal farmers and women and school students are said to have signed this petition to the authorities. The petition by Chomsky etc. becomes irrelevant before this petition by those who have suffered at the hands of Naxals.
https://dynastycrooks.wordpress.com/
I would request all those who have signed the letter and those who are planning to get their 15 minutes of fame by signing the next one, to kindly read the above to understand why Shri Rao is in jail.
The last time Noam Chomsky and 150 others signed a open letter on the “cancel culture”, most had not even read the letter. Have they read this one? Do they really know if Shri Rao is a poet or a terrorist, who is behind bars not because of someone’s whims but after a legal process?
Sympathy is all very fine, but don’t forget the fact that anti-national activities is why this man is in jail. How does it matter even if he is the world’s best poet? Does that give him license to break the law?