India: Arrest of activist Shamim Modi

Background

Shamim Modi, an activist of Shramik Adivasi Sangathan and the Vice
President of Samajwadi Jan Parishad (SJP), Madhya Pradesh, was arrested on 10th February 2009 and remanded to 14 days judicial custody by Harda CJM court. She has been engaged with the issues of adivasis, hammals and
mill-workers in Betul and Harda (M.P.) for many years. The ongoing
struggles of workers in saw-mills and plywood factories demanding proper working conditions and against the rampant violation of labour laws had led the industries association of Harda to demand the arrest of Shamim Modi. The government obliged by promptly arresting her. The industrialists’ ultimatum was part of a larger conspiracy to teach lessons to the social and political activists in the state. Her bail was denied on the ground that “a well educated lady having legal knowledge, involved in anti state activities cannot be granted bail†.

The criminal charge levelled against her pertains to a case filed two years ago. This case was filed against her because her organisation had intervened in an instance of brutality against tribals by a forest officer O.P. Patel and his staff even though the F.I.R. clearly states that Shamim was not present at the site of the incident. She has been charged with the kidnapping of Phoolwati bai from Harda hospital.

Shamim’s arrest was being continued on the basis of the government’s
claims in court that Shamim Modi has been indulging in anti-state activities. The issue is serious since mere utterances by the prosecution without a scrap of evidence of any anti-state activity was being accepted by the court to prolong detention. More so, because the arrest was being conducted at the behest of mill-owners to prevent workers from expressing their legitimate and just demands.

Following her arrest a fact finding team was also constituted and members of this team made a day long visit to Hoshangabad and Harda on 26th February 2009. The aim of this trip was to understand the situation better and also to put pressure on the authorities to take serious note of the harassment Shamim and other member and supporters of Shramik Adivasi Sangathan have been facing. The team also wanted to show solidarity with the struggle of the protesting mill workers in Harda.

Meeting Shamim in Hoshangabad jail

In the morning the team met Shamim at Hoshangabad jail. The meeting
was held in the presence of the jailor and many things mentioned below
were said by her when the jailor got distracted by other visitors.

Shamim appeared upbeat and told us that the first 5 days in Hoshangabad prison were really hard and she faced a lot of harassment and threats from the jail authorities to fall in line (keep quite) or face the consequences. When this team met her, she had already spent 2 weeks in jail and fearing for her safety had managed to reach some compromises with the jail authorities. For several days she was not being allowed to meet anyone, including her lawyers, but the situation changed after she was presented in front of the CJM Harda on 24th February where she had complained about not being given medicines, not being given access to pen and paper and not being allowed to meet any one. In fact she was not even allowed to make a phone call to her son who was ill. After hearing her, CJM Harda ordered that she be given pen and paper. She informed the team that she was arrested from her bedroom without being given any time to make phone calls or collect her belongings and shockingly was not even informed about the charges under which she was being arrested. But at least policewomen were present when she was arrested. She complained to us that she was being kept with murder convicts etc and not separately as a political prisoner should have been kept.

Shamim narrated an incident to us which goes to shows that even when
she was in jail, there was a constant effort to frame her in more false cases. When she was shifted from Harda to Hoshangabad jail, she had her mobile with her. Even after thorough checking of her person and her belongings, both the jail authorities ‘failed’ to find this mobile phone. As soon as she was transferred to Hoshangabad jail, other women inmates pounced on her to take away all her belongings and in the process also stripped her. When she protested, they threatened that they could do much worse. Strangely enough, these women inmates too failed to discover the mobile. Shamim believes that the jail authorities instigated this ‘attack’ by women inmates to intimidate her. She also believes that the jail authorities knew all along that she had a mobile with her but were deliberately not finding it, so they can frame her in more cases. After two days, Shamim surrendered her mobile phone to ensure that they don’t find more excuses to continue her incarceration.

There was a lot of coverage in the local press about her arrest and about her situation in jail. Any such reporting led to her facing harassment in the hands of the jail authorities and further complicating the situation for her. In case it was reported that she is being harassed and being denied her basic rights, the jail authorities threatened to harass her further because she was maligning their name and in case there was report of her not really being mistreated in jail, there was pressure on the jail authorities from the State government authorities to do the contrary. Shamim expressed feeling completely helpless in jail, sometimes fearing for her safety. She requested the team to also not talk to press about her condition
in jail while she was there.

After a few of these incidents, Shamim had managed to reach some kind
of a compromise with the jail authorities that she won’t talk to anyone about her previous ill treatment and in return they will leave her alone.

Shamim had slowly befriended other jail inmates also. While narrating
about the conditions in the jail Shamim told us about the horrific conditions of other women inmates in the Hoshangabad jail. These women have been denied their basic rights like access to clean drinking water, proper food and the less said the better about the hygiene situation with women being denied access to sanitary napkins. Women use pieces of old discarded and moth-eaten blankets for sanitary protection, often leading to rashes and infections for which hardly any treatment is offered.

Shamim showed us the petition addressed to Chief Justice of M.P. High
Court which she had written regarding her incarceration. After much
persuasion the jail authorities permitted Shamim to give us a copy. It
was decided that the team will send a similar petition to the Chief Justice urging that Shamim be allowed to be present before him and to argue her case. Shamim also gave us names of some officials in Delhi who could be contacted and who might help regarding the case in various ways.

On asking her about what she specifically wants to be done, she replied that pressure should be built for quashing all the charges against the activists in related cases, and getting her bail as soon as possible as she can work much more productively from outside. (Shamim was granted bail on 2nd March)

After meeting Shamim in Hoshangabad Jail, we went to Harda

Meeting mill workers and Phoolwatibai in Harda

We met with Phoolwatibai and Ramnath Nisodh in Samajwadi Janparishad office.

Phoolwatibai told us that she is from Dhenga village and is an activist of Samajwadi Janparishad. She, her brother-in-law and his wife were beaten by rifle butt by forest ranger O.P. Patel on 11th July 2007. Patel also fired a few rounds from his rifle in the air. Soon other villagers gathered to rescue them and thrashed the ranger O.P Patel. They were in the Harda hospital and the next day when Shamim was taking Phoolwatibai and her sister-in-law to appear before the magistrate at the Harda court and lodge a complaint against the beatings, they were stopped by the police in front of the Harda District Court and were beaten up mercilessly by the police women. And later a ward boy was made to register a case of kidnapping against Shamim Modi. These two women and Phoolwatibai’s brother-in-law were then taken to Bhopal and a false case was filed against Shamim that
she had kidnapped these tribal women from police custody. A case was
also lodged against Shamim and Anurag Modi (another member of the
Sanghatan) that it was due to their instigation that the adivasi people of Dhenga village had beaten up the ranger even though it was mentioned in the FIR that these two were not present on the scene.

During the first two days in Bhopal they were not given anything to eat and the doctor merely wrapped a cloth on the head injury that Phoolwatibai’s brother-in-law had sustained. On Shamim’s petition, the High Court ordered that the two women be presented in the High Court and that they be treated in a Jabalpur Hospital. Phoolwatibai presented her case before the chief justice. She further told us that in her area no one had ever fought elections except Jats and Bishnois so she had really angered the strong men of these upper castes when she stood for Panchayat elections and they started harassing her ever since then.

Phoolwatibai clearly denied that she had been kidnapped and has done
so in many press conferences in the State. She said that it was ridiculous that her co worker in the struggle was being framed on such charges and even after her statement denying the charge of kidnapping the case had not been squashed. And also that they were being implicated in a case as offenders when the crime had actually been committed against them.

Ramnath Nisodh told us that he used to be a hammal in a saw mill till
recently. He said that there are approximately 65 saw mills in the region employing about 1200-1500 workers. These workers don’t even get the minimum wages of Rs. 127/- per day as stipulated by the State Government - women workers getting Rs 50/- per day and men workers Rs
60/- per day. They have to work from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. and additionally
do over-time by working late into the night to somehow make ends meet.
To ‘compensate’ for the Sunday ‘off day’ they have to compulsorily work till 10 p.m. on Saturdays as also on the days preceding National holidays. On many sundays and holidays they are called for work but not paid for these extra days. Around 70-100 workers formed the Aara Mill Mazdoor Kranti Union last year and since Diwali they started to demand for Rs. 100/- as daily wages. This led to these workers becoming an eye-sore for the mill owners. Last assembly election Ramnath along with some other workers was canvassing for Shamim during the assembly elections. This canvassing was being done only on Sundays which is their off day. Natwar Patel, who owns most of the saw mills in Harda was unhappy about these workers canvassing for Shamim and told them to stop this and canvass for Kamal Patel, the sitting BJP MLA instead. When these workers refused, 20 of them were asked not to come to work. 11 of these workers lodged an FIR
against Natwar Patel for this reason and he was arrested on the same
day at the behest of the State Election Commission. Natwar Patel was
arrested and released on bail within 36 hours. Ramnath Nisodh also
told us about how when Natwar Patel was arrested the thana was full of
his supporters and the 11 workers who had filed the complaint had to
face this threatening crowd. Ramnath added “the way they were behaving
it didn’t even seem like he was the accused and we were the
complainants.â€

Later Natwar Patel ensured that the 11 people who had lodged the FIR
against him don’t get employment in any other mill. As a consequence,
these 11 people are being refused jobs in all the mills and the
reason being “tumhee logoan hee Natwar Patel ko giraftar karwaya
thha.†(you people only got him arrested) Situation for these 11
workers has thus become very precarious and they are unable to make
ends meet. They had also petitioned the D.M., Harda who promised that
they will get ’sahayta rashi’ of Rs. 99/- per day but till date they
had not got the promised money. To protest Shamim’s arrest, 100
workers had gone on a strike and all of them have been thrown out of
their jobs.

Meeting with DM Harda

The D.M. Pushpalata Singh was busy in some official program and after
some persuasion agreed to meet the team. She said that she was aware
of Shamim’s arrest and had met her in the past but refused to comment
about denial of bail as the matter was sub-judice. The team asked her
to brief the investigating officer of this case to ensure that no false evidence was filed against Shamim as he was an officer directly under her charge. We also urged her to ensure that Shamim was not harassed further upon her release.

On being enquired about the pathetic working conditions of the saw
mills in Harda she told us that only one factory came under the
Factory Act and she had written to the Shram Ayukta (Labour Commissioner) in Indore in this regard. She also said that she had been following up on the petition of the 11 workers to ensure that they get the promised ‘Sahayata Rashi’ in 10-12 days. The team urged her to expedite this matter.

The team was not sure if DM Pushpalata will keep her promises and we
have to build pressure of her to ensure that the workers get what is
due to them and that Shamim is not harassed when she is released from
jail.

Meeting with the mill owners

A part of the team went to meet with the mill owners and the members
of the Traders lobby in Harda. We visited the aara mill of Kamal
Patel and met with him. The team could not get to speak with any of
the workers because as soon as we entered the owners were alerted and
any interaction between us and the workers was stopped. However, we
could have a discussion with the owners.

During the discussion the mill owners accepted that they had given an
ultimatum to the District administration that if they did not take
action against Shamim Modi and Anurag Modi, they would move their
industries from Harda. They also admitted that it was because Shamim
was “instigating†workers against them and getting false cases filed
against them by workers that they had given such an ultimatum. They
felt that this was the right thing and they did nothing wrong by giving such an ultimatum. They denied that the workers were being underpaid or they were violating any labour laws. Kamal Patel also denied that he had fired any worker in the past year for associating with Shamim Modi. He said that the cases against him were false, and were being filed to harass him. On repeated questioning they did agree that there could be some scope for improvement in the mills. But they felt that the way that the workers were being ‘organised’ was not the way to improve things, clearly showing their displeasure at the workers demanding minimum wages and better working conditions. They kept mentioning that if social activist were interested in working for the poor then they must get involved in running schools, holding health camps etc and not such ’activities’. Organising workers against them was not going to be tolerated. They also mentioned that this was the first time that cases were filed against them by their workers and they were particularly disturbed by this. They also said that Shamim had been arrested on an old case that had nothing to do with them but also admitted to the fact that they had given an ultimatum to the district administration demanding her arrest in 48 hours and that it did happen in the stipulated time.

This brings out the compliance of the administration under pressure from the industrialists. And clearly shows that it is the work that Sanghatan has been doing to organise workers that has led to this arrest.

We live in times when the State is increasingly cracking down on activists to silence any voice of dissent. Any utterance or action that challenges the State, or is perceived as challenging it, is labelled as an anti-state activity. It is also unfortunate that democratic process like coming together to raise labour issues, to voice concerns and organize for basic rights is being perceived as illegal and anti state. We as team on meeting with the various workers of the Shramik Advasi Sanghatan, could see that their struggle is for legitimate demands. Most of the people the Sangathan works with and is
organising are adivasis and dalits. The team also met with Shamim’s
lawyers in the Harda court (Ranjana Bharadwaj and two others) and we
perceived a lot of support for Shamim Modi and the Sanghatan. The three women lawyers that we met told us that they fully supported the work that the Sangahtan was doing and it was because they were raising problamatic issues about people in power that the Sanghatan workers like Shamim were being harassed. At the time that we visited there were also arrest warrants against Phoolwatibai, her husband and Anurag Modi. The meetings with Phoolwatibai and Ramnath Nisodh, give testimony to the fact that there is struggle growing in the area against the unfair practices by the State as well as the industrialists. The confidence and the conviction showed by the workers was apparent from the way they spoke and also from the fact that Ramnath Nisod, volunteered to accompany the team to mills even though he realised that such a move would further jeopardise his chances of getting work. But he felt that to if they had to raise a voice for their rights then they would have to be ready for such persecution. In
our perception it is clear that there is an attempt to isolate and harass people who are seen as supporters of the Sangathan and the work it is
doing.

We have no choice but to continue to challenge the State to ensure that free speech and right to dissent remain a part of our democratic rights. Last few years have seen several incidents of activists in various states being unlawfully detained and denied bail. Denying bail has become a weapon that is being used to silence these voices. It is this growing trend that lead to the arrest of Shamim Modi and the subsequent denial of bail.

We demand that:

• All false cases against Shamim and other activists in related cases
  be quashed immediately.
• The State Government and the State Election Commission should ensure that Shamim Modi and other members of Samajwadi Janparishad are not harassed.
• All the workers who have been unduly fired be immediately reinstated and in the meanwhile the district administration of Harda should
  provide necessary financial relief to them.
• The district administration of Harda should protect the democratic
  right of each and every worker of the saw mills in Harda to campaign for any candidate of their choice and to ensure they do not face any
  harassment by their employers in this regard.
• It is the responsibility of the district administration to protect the constitutional rights of the workers of the saw mills in Harda and we urge them to urgently take up the matter of minimum wages and better working conditions of these workers.

Members of fact finding team:

• Deepti, Saheli Women’s Resource Centre, New Delhi.
• Rina, Kashipur Solidarity Group, New Delhi
• Pyoli, Pratidhwani, New Delhi
• Rinchin, Madhya Pradesh Mahila Manch, Bhopal
• Jyoti, Madhya Pradesh Mahila Manch, Hoshangabad
• Smita, Samajwadi Janparishad, Kesla
• Laury, Sahmat, Itarsi
• Uma and Giri (from Shahpur,)
• Bablu, Samajwadi Janparishad, Harda

The team was joined by the following in Harda:

• Sylvie (Chittroopa Palit), Bhagwan Mukhati, and three other comrades of NBA (Krishna Bai, Village Bichola, Distt harda, Sushila, Village
  Lotia, Harda, Kala Bai, village Kutch Khedi, village Harda )
• Prachi, Mansi, Indore