• About Us
    • About the platform
    • Editorial Collective
  • Essays
    • Short Essays
    • Longer Reads
    • Reviews
    • Interviews
  • Series
    • Reimagining, remembering and reclaiming water
    • Political Ecologies of the Far Right
    • Green inequalities in the city
    • Authoritarianism, populism and political ecology
    • Ecology after Capitalism
    • Ecomodernist socialism and comunist futurism
    • Political Ecology for Civil Society
    • World Press Photography Awards
  • Resources
  • Events and Calls
  • Art & multimedia
  • Contribute
  • About Us
    • About the platform
    • Editorial Collective
  • Essays
    • Short Essays
    • Longer Reads
    • Reviews
    • Interviews
  • Series
    • Reimagining, remembering and reclaiming water
    • Political Ecologies of the Far Right
    • Green inequalities in the city
    • Authoritarianism, populism and political ecology
    • Ecology after Capitalism
    • Ecomodernist socialism and comunist futurism
    • Political Ecology for Civil Society
    • World Press Photography Awards
  • Resources
  • Events and Calls
  • Art & multimedia
  • Contribute
  • About Us
    • About the platform
    • Editorial Collective
  • Essays
    • Short Essays
    • Longer Reads
    • Reviews
    • Interviews
  • Series
    • Reimagining, remembering and reclaiming water
    • Political Ecologies of the Far Right
    • Green inequalities in the city
    • Authoritarianism, populism and political ecology
    • Ecology after Capitalism
    • Ecomodernist socialism and comunist futurism
    • Political Ecology for Civil Society
    • World Press Photography Awards
  • Resources
  • Events and Calls
  • Art & multimedia
  • Contribute
Call open for 8th International Degrowth Conference (The Hague, NL, 24-28 August)
February 11, 2021
Forests are not just sites of climate mitigation
March 3, 2021

Indian Academics and Researchers Condemn Government-Led Repression of Dissent

Published by Undisciplined Environments on February 23, 2021

Indian scholars have launched a petition to condemn the arrest of Disha Ravi, a 22-year-old youth climate and social activist, which adds to the growing number of instances of the Indian government’s targeting of social justice and human rights activists, in the context of intentisying mass protests.

We, the undersigned, condemn the arrest of Disha Ravi, a 22-year-old youth climate and social activist, who the Delhi Police arrested from her home in Bengaluru without following due process. We note that Ravi’s arrest adds to the growing number of instances in which the Government has targeted social justice and human rights activists, including the 23-year-old Dalit labour rights activist, Nodeep Kaur, who was arrested on 12 January from the site of Farmers’ Protests near the Singhu border and who has reportedly been tortured in police custody. Indeed, students and young activists, especially from minority communities, have been facing persecution by the Central Government for a long time now, simply because they chose to speak up as conscientious citizens of this country.

Various Indian law enforcement agencies and state governments have sought to intimidate, discredit, and prosecute students and young activists alongside other groups, such as farmers, laborers, academics, journalists, comedians, and ordinary citizens, for merely exercising their right to disagree with and question the Government, and support struggles they deem just and important.

Young people asking questions and protesting against injustice are upholding the most valued tenets of democracy. The increasingly repressive tactics employed by the Government to stifle these voices, create an environment of suspicion, instil fear, and curb any critical discussion and dialogue will undermine India’s democracy. We should strive to be a society in which people, especially the youth, are unafraid to ask questions and have the freedom to stand for democracy, secularism, and human freedoms.

We stand by the youth activists who have shown the courage to stand up for themselves, their fellow human beings, the future of the nation, and the health of the planet.

We demand that Disha Ravi, Nodeep Kaur and others, arrested merely for supporting the farmers movements and for protesting against the Government, be released, and all charges against them dropped. We also demand that warrants of a similar nature against others be withdrawn.

We demand that law enforcement agencies stop using anti-terror laws to terrorise citizens and repeal the antiquated sedition laws, which have repeatedly been abused to repress peaceful protests.

We urge every conscientious citizen of India, and citizens of the world, to ask questions of those in authority. We intend to keep asking questions of the Indian Government, whose leaders and officials have been speaking for the environment and human rights in global forums while engaging in blatant violations at home.

Prakash Kashwan, University of Connecticut, Storrs

Tejal Kanitkar, NIAS, Bengaluru

Ashish Kothari, Researcher-activist, Pune

Amita Baviskar, Ashoka University

Nikita Sud, University of Oxford

Nagraj Adve, Teachers Against the Climate Crisis

Sharachchandra Lele

—

The petition is available at Change.org: Indian Academics and Researchers Condemn Government-Led Repression of Dissent

Feature image: Protests against the arrest of Nodeep Kaur. Credit: PTI/Kamal Singh, via The Wire 

Share
Undisciplined Environments
Undisciplined Environments

Related posts

June 8, 2022

Seminar: “Energy Transitions from Below: From Climate Colonialism to Energy Sovereignty”, 15 June


Read more
June 2, 2022

EXALT Webinar Conference “Green Extractivism & Violent Conflict” on June 17


Read more
May 3, 2022

Environmental Humanities 2021-2022 Lecture Series at NKUA


Read more

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Search this site

✕

Subscribe to our Newsfeed

We keep your data private and share your data only with third parties that make this service possible. See our Privacy Policy for more information.

Check your inbox or spam folder to confirm your subscription.

Tags

Agriculture Alternatives Anthropocene Art Brazil Capitalism Cities Climate change Climate crisis Climate justice Colonialism, Post-colonialism & Decolonization Commoning Commons Conflicts Conservation & Biodiversity COVID-19 Culture Decolonial Political Ecologies Degrowth Democracy Development Disaster Energy Environmental Change Environmental History Environmental Justice Environmental movements Extractivism Food Forests Green inequalities Indigenous Peoples Land Methodologies Mining & Extractivism Movements & Resistance Neoliberalism Post-colonialism Post-colonialism & Decolonization Social Movements & Resistance Urban Violence Waste Water water governance

Visit WEGO

wegoint.org
This website is co-funded by WEGO

Popular Posts

  • Far Right Ecologism and the Conceptual Deficiencies of Ecofascism 893 views
  • Women Vs. Mining: A Video Project 254 views
  • The dystopian world of the Handmaid’s tale 2/2 243 views
  • Indigenous Science 207 views
  • Seminar: “Energy Transitions from Below: From Climate Colonialism to Energy Sovereignty”, 15 June 202 views
  • A comprehensive political ecology reading list 179 views

Recent Comments

  • April 22, 2022

    Europe: Our Wounds Are Bridges – Global Dialogue for Systemic Change commented on Post-Extractive Futures (Workshop-Conversation-Festival)

  • April 21, 2022

    Podcast: The threads that bind us from Syria to Ukraine commented on Post-Extractive Futures (Workshop-Conversation-Festival)

  • April 10, 2022

    Undisciplined Environments commented on Colonial Climates, Decolonial Futures: Reflections from Puerto Rico

  • April 10, 2022

    Constanza V commented on Colonial Climates, Decolonial Futures: Reflections from Puerto Rico

  • April 6, 2022

    Colonial Ecologies of the Half Earth - Resilience commented on Political ecology gone wrong

  • April 6, 2022

    Colonial Ecologies of the Half Earth - Resilience commented on A conversation with Rob Nixon

Follow us

facebook       twitter
E-Mail Us : undisciplinedenvironments@gmail.com

Contribute

If you want to contribute send us your text at undisciplinedenvironments@gmail.com
Find our posting guide here

About Us

We are a collective of scholars and activists oriented towards a common horizon of emancipatory social and ecological transformation. With this platform, we aim to animate a space to share, debate and critically reflect on research and activist experiences, observations, methodologies, news, events, publications, art, music and other themes and objects related to political ecology.
powered by andromedia
  • About Us
  • Essays
  • Series
  • Resources
  • Events and Calls
  • Art & multimedia
  • Contribute
go