IT News
Imphal, July 16:
Representing both the Extrajudicial Execution Victim Families Association, Manipur (EEVFAM) and the Human Rights Alert (HRA), Babloo Loitongbam made his formal briefing on India at the UN Human Rights Committee, Geneva on Monday, 15 July 2024. Delivering his Statement, he raised two issues.
At the first instance, he drew the attention of the UN Human Rights Committee on the observance of July 15 in Manipur as Anti-Repression Day. Exactly 20 years ago on that day, a dozen mothers of Manipur disrobed themselves in front of the Kangla Fort, protesting the rape and murder of Thangjam Manorama by the Assam Rifles personnel. The public fury that burst into a sustained protest subsided only after the then Prime Minister of India promised that the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) would be replaced by a more humane act. The AFSPA was heavily criticized by this Committee during the 2nd and 3rd periodic review of India. However, the Supreme Court of India upheld its constitutionality in 1997 and simply ignored the specific request of this Committee to examine its Covenant compatibility. 15 years later, following the maiden visit of the Special Rapporteur on Summary, Arbitrary or Extrajudicial Execution, Prof. Christof Hynes observed the powers granted under AFSPA were in reality broader than that allowable under the state of emergency as the right to life may effectively be suspended under the Act.
Citing the petition to the Supreme Court seeking justice for 1,528 cases of extrajudicial executions, he stressed AFSPA was incompatible with the Covenant both in law as well as in practice.
At the second instance, Babloo Loitongbam highlighted the plight of Manipur wherein at least 230 deaths, more than 13,000 homes and religious places destroyed; leaving some 60,000 displaced persons to be interned in cramped, sub-humane relief camps since Manipur has been crippled with an unending cycle of violence from the May 3, 2023. Narrating the union government’s inaction to contain the violence in Manipur where enforced indifference of the armed forces allowing cycles of raids and counter raids against the civilian population, devoid of any humanitarian norms, he opined the whole drama clearly constitutes Crime against Humanity. He criticized the Government of India systematically abdicated its Responsibility to Protect the population as individual citizens of Manipur irrespective of gender, age, religion or ethnicity — had been robbed of their most basic and fundamental human rights. Later, he requested the Committee to formulate an appropriate recommendation in line with the State obligation under the Covenant, read with the other relevant principles of international law.
