Dr Binayak Sen is a prominent community health advocate and civil liberties activist in India. He’s won recognition and awards from national and international bodies. Late last year he was sentenced to life imprisonment for conspiracy and sedition.

Coming from an elite background, Binayak Sen trained as a paediatrician but rejected the option of a comfortable job in a city hospital. Instead, he set up shop in a tiny office in a desolate area, dedicating his life to the most marginalised of the country’s poor – the adhivasis (tribal communities) of central India.

Community health pioneers
Along with his wife Ilina, a prominent feminist and scholar in her own right, Dr Sen set up the NGO Rupantar in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh. Rupantar has built a village health clinic, initiated agricultural programmes focusing on food security and distribution, and established several projects to empower women, including helping victims of domestic violence. The Sens pioneered community health in a region that receives little or no government help.

Government critic
Dr Sen has always insisted that education, economic development, community health, nonviolence and human rights are all essential elements in lessening the influence of Maoist insurgents on the tribal communities of central India. He has long been a critic of the government’s neglect and persecution of the adhivasi.

The fact that the District Court has delivered such a harsh sentence could be, according to Human Rights Watch spokesperson Elaine Pearson, “an attempt to make an example of him… [to show just how] indignant the state is about the fact that he criticised their policies.”

Violence in the “Red Corridor”
Chhatisgarh lies in the heart of what is known as India’s “Red Corridor”, a region that spans five states and encompasses hundreds of thousands of kilometres of hilly jungle. The region has immense potential mining wealth – but is also home to millions of rural poor. This has led to what campaigners like Arundhati Roy say is a “clearing out operation”, where land is cleared of its inhabitants so its mineral resources can be exploited.

A government-backed militia group called the Salwa Judum has destroyed entire villages and raped and killed with impunity. Thousands of people have lost their homes to the violence and are languishing in “temporary” camps. Personal testimonies of atrocities by the Salwa Judum were documented in a 2008 Human Rights Watch report called “Being Neutral is our only crime”.

Maoist insurgents have pitted themselves against both the state authorities and the Salwa Judum. However, they too participate in the cycle of violence, destroying schools and villages and killing those they believe collaborate with the Central Reserve Police Forces (CRPF).
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has called the Maoists of central India the country’s most “serious national security threat.” In November 2009, the government launched Operation Green Hunt and sent in tens of thousands of troops to deal with the Maoists once and for all. The action is on-going.

Draconian laws
The authorities in the region also routinely enforce some of India’s most draconian laws: the Special Public Securities Act and the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act – which give extraordinary powers to the security forces.

In 2007, Dr Sen was arrested by Chhatisgarh police on charges of sedition and conspiracy. He was charged with passing 33 letters from jailed Maoist leader Narayan Sanyal to Maoist rebels. He protested that he visited the accused at the request of Sanyal’s brother, who was concerned about his medical condition. Dr Sen also proved that each visit was overseen by prison guards, so it’s hard to imagine how letters could have been passed without detection.

Dr Sen spent two years in jail without trial before a national and international outcry secured his release on bail in 2009. On December 24th last year, the Raipur District Court sentenced him to life imprisonment and Dr Sen was immediately jailed. He and his family plan an appeal which could go all the way to the Delhi Supreme Court.

Rare integrity
On January 4th, 2011, Binayak Sen’s 61st birthday, a group of physicians, health activists and human right defenders founded the Indian chapter of Physicians of Human Rights, naming Dr Sen as its Honorary Chairman. The group sent out a press release calling for “the dropping of charges, [and] recognition of his exceptional contribution to health and human rights, his sacrifices and his deep commitment and rare integrity, [and] his proclaimed consistent support of nonviolence.

Activists are also planning public protests about the sentencing and the misuse of the charge of sedition.