A group of 10 students and activists, including a woman journalist who were arrested in Uttar Pradesh’s Ghazipur district while they were on a ‘Satyagraha’ foot march to Delhi have gone on a hunger strike in the jail.
In a letter to the District Magistrate, addressed through the jail superintendent Ghazipur, they said they were starting a fast from 5 pm on Thursday against their arrest.
“We have been put in jail without a proper reason,” they said in the letter accessed by The Hindu .
“This is not just a violation of our human rights but also it is putting us to serious mental torture,” they said. “To oppose this and to avail our human and citizen rights, we all will fast until we are free.”
While the police have accused them of misleading people on the CAA and the proposed nationwide National Register of Citizens (NRC), friends of those arrested, under the banner of Team Nagrik Satyagraha, accused the police of trying to “shrink and divert the objective” of the yatra.
“In [the] FIR they said our yatra is against CAA and NRC. This is an attempt of police and administration to divert the whole agenda of this journey. Our yatra is against every form of violence and hate which exists in society and to spread [the] idea of Gandhi,” the group said in a statement.
District Magistrate Ghazipur and superintendent of the jail did not respond to phone calls made to inquire about the hunger strike.
The associates of the jailed persons had on Wednesday expressed shock after a local Sub-Divisional Magistrate (SDM) court issued them notices for bail bonds of ₹2.5 lakh each, and two Gazetted persons per individual as guarantors.
The students, mostly associated with the Banaras Hindu University, along with the journalist and social activists, were leading a foot march from Chauri-Chaura near Gorakhpur to Rajghat in Delhi. On the ninth day of the march, after completing 250 km, the 10 persons were arrested in Ghazipur under Sections 107/16/151 of the CrPC (Criminal Procedure Code) and sent to jail on Tuesday, said Team Nagrik Satyagraha, the organisers.
Those arrested were identified as Pradeepika Saraswat, a journalist, Manish Sharma, Sheshnarayan Ojha, Priyesh Kumar Pandey, Anant Shukla, Atul Yadav, Neeraj Rai, Raj Abhishek, Ravidnda Kumar Ravi and Murari Kumar. They are aged 25-30 years.
The SDM court of Ghazipur Sadar issued a notice asking them why they should not appear before it and submit the bonds to maintain peace and order.
They have been accused of holding the padyatra without seeking permission and allegedly “instigating and misleading” locals against the CAA and the NRC, the order notes. Their alleged acts could breach public peace and cause ‘disaffection’, the order said.
There are “enough grounds” to act against them under CrPC 107/116, the SDM said in the order shared by Team Nagrik Satyagraha with this paper.
The 10 have been sent to 14 days judicial custody.
The Team Nagrik Satyagraha described the SDM order as ‘bizarre’.
“Why will a government officer take someone’s bail when he works under the same government? This is an attempt to further suppress the democratic rights of citizens,” said the group. “They even have problem with people who are spreading idea of Gandhi and telling to stay away from Hindu-Muslim fight (sic),” the statement added.
