At the heart of all peoples’ rights work is the individual – as the person at risk of human rights abuses, as the survivor, as the partner in the defense of rights, and as the activist speaking out, and working with and for other individuals. Individuals, as part of the political, social and cultural collective and spread over the length and breadth of the country, lie behind much of the activism of Indian social-political groups, working at local, grassroots and community levels in India today. They try to change lives by acting on their own or with other people and political groups making the same demand – an end to injustice in all its forms.

These individuals are increasingly at risk in India today. We have witnessed the killings at regular intervals of activists like Safdar Hashmi, Shankar Guha Niyogi, Satyendra Dubey, Sarita and Mahesh, S. Manjunath, Mahendra Singh and Chandra Shekhar in the past two decades. We have had a series of cases of arrest and detention of people like Dr. Binayak Sen and T. G. Ajay. At a time when the patterns of human rights abuses against rights activists are becoming widespread and showing signs of further deterioration, with the governments showing their apathy, we need to draw attention to the situation, point to the concrete failures of the governments to live up to their obligations, and plan on some concrete actions, so that the human rights activists can carry out their important work free from attacks, fear or reprisals.

Yesterday it was Narayan Hareka, a naib sarpanch from Kandha tribal community in the village Kambivalsa, Narayanpatna block, Koraput district, Orissa, who was fighting against liquor brewing, private money lending, land alienation and corruption, who was murdered in early May 2008. Today, in mid-May, it was the murder of Lalit Kumar Mehta of Palamau district, Jharkhand, who had been fearlessly raising the issue of corruption over NREGA. And tomorrow, it will be credible social activists like Leo Saldanha and his wife Dr. Lakshmi Nilakantan of Bangalore, who are being targeted by the Karnataka police and the Forest Department for sandalwood smuggling, forest encroachment and theft, because of their role in unearthing the land scam in the controversial Bangalore Mysore Infrastructure Corridor Project.

A man being tortured in detention for peacefully speaking about his religious beliefs, a woman anganwadi worker defending her community’s rights and facing death threats, a panchayat leader defending a community at risk of forced eviction and harassed at the hands of local police and administration, a journalist activist imprisoned solely for a non-violent expression of his opinions, supporting a survivor of rape fighting for justice and getting life threats — there is no dearth of stories about rights activists facing a range of challenges. They are subjected to death threats and torture, persecuted through the use and abuse of the judicial system, silenced by restrictive laws, disappeared or murdered. Despite this, no mechanism exists today at the district, state, regional or national levels, which offers any protection to those working to protect and promote our constitutional rights. The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) and its state editions, and the Commission established for women, minorities or scheduled castes and tribes, are often addressed by the victim activists for redressal. However, in the absence of a focused system for monitoring, documenting and reporting human rights violations of human rights activists, and the lack of an approach for timely, pro-active intervention to provide justice to them, the Commissions more often fail to arrest these continuing violations. Why do the Commissions themselves do not develop a system of taking actions on violations related with the rights activists?

Where are our governments, who are parties to numerous international and regional human rights treaties and thus, have voluntarily undertaken a legal commitment to protect the rights activists? The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) contains important standards relevant for the work of rights activists. In addition to the UDHR, the Declaration on the Right and Responsibility of Individuals, Groups and Organs of Society to Promote and Protect Universally Recognised Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (Declaration on Human Rights Defenders), which was adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1998, is a set of safeguards designed to guarantee and ensure the protection of human rights defenders. These include the right to know, seek, obtain and receive information about human rights and fundamental freedoms; the right to participate in peaceful activities against violations of human rights; the right to criticise and complain when governments fail to comply with human rights standards; and the right to make proposals for improvement. In line with the UN Declaration, why cannot the work of rights activists, including those working on economic, social and cultural rights, be recognised and legitimatised? Instead of them being harassed, the governments should take necessary steps to develop a national plan of action that should include multi-disciplinary proposals at the political, legal and practical levels, which aim to improve the environment in which rights activists operate; the measures to ensure their immediate protection and the allocation of appropriate human and financial resources.

Along with mechanisms and laws, there is a need to call on a wider human rights community for intervention and support. This community must include political activists and leaders, inter-governmental organisations, human rights bodies, international organisations and professionals. If the arrest of someone like Dr. Binayak Sen is met with a lukewarm response from the established bodies of the medical fraternity and the inter-governmental organisations, if the recent killings of Narayan Hareka and Lalit Mehta do not even arouse an active response of those people and groups who are working on NREGA, it shows the lack of solidarity, networking and common action in the human rights community. Rights are not just concepts and laws. They are not only about project-making, training, advocacy and building capacity. They also mean showing courage and mobilising thousands of activists as fast as possible, when someone is arrested, killed, or facing immediate and often life-threatening human rights violations. If a fragile ‘peoples rights concern’ is to withstand the vagaries of political ebb and flow, future attacks on activists and practical applicability of rights will need to be anticipated and forestalled. The continuous hardships of rights activists, working in different contexts and cultures, presses the point that they must not remain only our reactive agenda, but should be a progressive proposition for a better future.

At a time when we have ‘failed states’ like Chhatisgarh and Orissa — those without any functioning human rights governance — there is formidable challenge for the work of human rights activists. Where the institutions necessary for the delivery of justice — from law enforcement to health care and education — are either entirely lacking or dependent on weak authority, and the rights are regularly abused by companies, armed groups, security forces and religious leaders, the challenge is how to work creatively with and through political and social structures, in order to prevent and redress immediate abuses, and build a framework of protective safeguards at the local and community levels as well.