Yug Chaudhary, lawyer of activist Sudha Bharadwaj who has been in custody since her arrest in the Bhima Koregaon case in 2018, on Sunday said the purported evidence against her lacked “sanctity” and was “too poor” to be admissible.
At a webinar, writers, activists and academics demanded that Bharadwaj be released from jail and urged the intelligentsia to follow her example and break their silence as the country’s institutions were no longer reliable.
Writer Nayantara Sahgal, who had returned her Sahitya Academy award in 2015 in protest against the killing of rationalists, released a book, Sudha Bharadwaj Speaks: A Life in Law and Activism, at the event.
Sudha Bharadwaj on Why She Joined the Trade Union Movement and Became a Lawyer We have to bring the Constitution to life. Thatâs where the lawyers and peoplesâ organisations have to work together.
Sudha Bharadwaj.
The following is an excerpt from Sudha Bharadwaj Speaks: A Life in Law and Activism published by the People’s Union for Civil Liberties. Bharadwaj, a lawyer, trade unionist and rights activist, was arrested in 2018 in the Elgar Parishad case. The book is based on a long interview of Bharadwaj conducted before her arrest by two young lawyers, Santanu Chakraborty and Darshana Mitra.
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Early life
How Social Movements Can Make Durable, Wider and Definite Contribution to Creating a Better World
Social movements have a very important role in society, a role that has to assume even more significance if our deeply troubled world has to find a way out of the survival crisis in which it is entangled very badly at the moment. Of course we are here talking of only sincere movements, and not of those movements which are merely fronts of various narrow interests. However even sincere and honest social movements have to function in a situation of several uncertainties and confusions in the present day complex world. In such a situation how can we ensure that social movements definitely make a positive contribution, and contribute in more durable and wider ways?