‘Clear exercise in intimidation’: Human Rights Forum condemns NIA raids on members in Andhra Pradesh

On Monday, the residences of HRF Andhra Pradesh state president U G Srinivasulu, state general secretary Y Rajesh, state vice-president K V Jagannadha Rao, state vice-president S Abdul Rasool, state secretary U M Devendra Babu, state executive committee member K Sudha and HRF Andhra Pradesh and Telangana coordination committee member A Chandrasekhar were searched in Kurnool district’s Adoni, Konaseema district’s Amalapuram, Srikakulam, Anantapur, Kurnool district’s Yemmiganur, Visakhapatnam and Anantapur, respectively.

The raids were pursuant to an FIR registered on November 11, 2020, at the Munchingput police station in Visakhapatnam district (now in Alluri Sitharamaraju district) related to certain rights activists having Maoist links and the NIA was hoping to recover “incriminating documents and materials, which are relevant to the investigation of the case”, an HRF statement said on Tuesday. “No such incriminating material was found anywhere in these seven premises,” the statement added.

The HRF, an NGO, said that NIA personnel confiscated the mobile phones of five HRF functionaries as well as other electronic equipment like hard drives, a laptop and some literature. The electronic devices, including mobiles, were seized without providing cloned copies to the owners, the HRF alleged.

“To confiscate these devices in such a sudden manner results in a stunning dispossession. It is not only a deprivation of valuable property of the functionaries concerned but also of their right to livelihood, privacy and human dignity. This amounts to an infringement of constitutional rights. There is also the very serious concern of potential evidence-tampering of electronic data,” the HRF said.

“The NIA release also describes HRF as a ‘front organisation of the Maoists’. This is a plain canard. Anyone familiar with HRF’s conceptual understanding of human rights and our practice would know this to be a brazen untruth. Seeking to criminalise our human rights activity will never succeed. HRF is not an appendage of the Maoists or any other political party,” Krishna said.

He added that the HRF was formed on October 11, 1998, and will “persist in spreading a human rights culture in society with the certitude that a broad-based and truly independent human rights movement is desirable and possible”. He also hit out at the NIA, saying it was “a faithful instrument of the ruling dispensation at the Centre that is deployed time and again to stifle dissent”.

“The real purpose of its baseless accusations and investigations is to intimidate, isolate and shame rights activists into silence. It is part of a concerted attempt to diminish and delegitimise the very notion of human rights in the public eye. The intention is to harass those critical of the political establishment’s retrograde policies and practices,” Krishna said, adding that the sedition law and Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act must be repealed as they “have no place in a democracy”.