By Express News Service
GUWAHATI: Against the backdrop of killings of civilians by the security forces in a botched up ambush in Nagaland, the Working Group on Human Rights in India and the UN (WGHR) raised pitch for the repeal of Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act or AFSPA.
The WGHR pointed out that the chief ministers of Nagaland, Meghalaya and Manipur had renewed calls to repeal AFSPA.
It said the controversial law was already lifted from Meghalaya and Tripura a few years ago.
“The repeal of AFSPA will strengthen the spirit of the country’s constitutional democracy. India’s human rights record is to be reviewed before its peers at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in October 2022. Repealing this Act would be a positive development to report to the UNHRC at that time,” the rights body said in a statement.
Expressing solidarity with the families of coal miners and protestors who lost their lives in Nagaland on December 4 and 5, the WGHR said this was not the first time that gross human rights violations were committed under the AFSPA that grants legal immunity for all acts to armed forces when enforced.
“…Despite the historic judgment of the Supreme Court of India in the Extra-judicial Execution Victim Families Association, Manipur case, followed by a CBI investigation into 39 out of the 1,528 cases of extra-judicial killings in that state, the Government of India is yet to grant prosecution sanction against any member of the armed forces found to be involved in the unlawful killings,” the rights body lamented.
It said the repeal of AFSPA had been a long-standing demand of the civilians, survivors, families of victims, human rights movements and activists around India, particularly those who had borne the brunt of this law in the Northeast.
The WGHR said the AFSPA had already attracted criticism from several quarters from within and outside India.
“In the last three cycles of India’s Universal Periodic Review at the UNHRC, several governments recommended the repeal, review or revision of AFSPA…The Government of India, however, has consistently not accepted, but only noted, these recommendations,” the right body said.
It added the Justice Jeevan Reddy Committee had recommended repealing AFSPA in 2005, calling the Act “a symbol of hate, oppression, and instrument of high-handedness”.
