K Balagopal: Civil liberties Vs Human Rights

Why remember K Balagopal now?

It is three weeks too late to remember him (on his birth day) and more than three months early, to remember him on his death anniversary. But why do we raise his spirit now? Because wherever there is a human rights violation, there is a reason to remember this wonderful human being. Because only yesterday, there was an inhuman attack on the CRPF men, and the Maoists killed at least 26 ‘men’. Don’t policemen have human rights? And civil liberties? What makes the Maoists think that the cops have sold their souls to the State? Aren’t they just discharging their duties?
In a recent essay on the Bhopal gas tragedy victims, Mr K G Kannabiran argues that the lives of those who lost their all seem to have been ‘sold out’ cheap by the government of India. Now how about the lives of the CRPF men (26) who were massacred yesterday, and a few months ago (more than 120). The APCLC is silent about it till the time of going to press. And they will be silent:

Now and in time to be,
Wherever green is worn…

Civil liberties vs Human Rights

I had the good fortune of listening to Dr K Balagopal only once; he was talking about how the naxals are rounded up by the police in their jurisdiction but actually ‘arrest’ them under a difference jurisdiction. The modus operandi ensures that the next of kin run to the nearest station house, and the police there don’t have the ‘missing person’ on their records. Of course, off the record, they know that the neighboring station which is ‘housing’ them.

And I remember seeing a man with thick-rimmed glasses who looked exactly like Dr K Balagopal, waiting for a bus in Nallakunta. I thought, then, that it cannot be Him. I am an unabashed worshipper of Him. God, please send a replacement soon!
Later in life, not surprisingly, Dr K Balagopal became a human rights activist, from being a civil liberties warrior. Proponents of the concept usually assert that everyone is endowed with certain entitlements merely by reason of being human. “No Freeman shall be taken or imprisoned, or be disseised of his Freehold, or Liberties, or free Customs, or be outlawed, or exiled, or any other wise destroyed; nor will We not pass upon him, nor condemn him, but by lawful judgment of his Peers, or by the Law of the land.” – The Magna Carta.

The Indian judiciary in a catena of cases has effectively resorted to the writ of habeas corpus only to secure release of a person from illegal detention. The Indian judiciary has dispensed with the traditional doctrine of locus standi, so that if a detained person is not in a position to file a petition, it can be moved on his behalf by any other person. The scope of habeas relief has expanded in recent times by actions of the Indian judiciary. The habeas writ was used in the Rajan criminal case.

check out for more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K._Balagopal