Author name: Human Rights Forum

The Human Rights Forum (HRF) has learnt from concerned citizens across the State, as well as from extensive reporting on the issue over the past several months, that the Odisha government has responded to peaceful and democratic resistance in Talaampadar (Kalahandi district) and Kutamal(Sungerpanchayat, Rayagada district) with intimidation, police violence, surveillance, arbitrary arrests and fabricated criminal cases. Midnight raids on villages, the deployment of heavily armed police forces, tear-gas attacks on sleeping families, physical assaults on villagers and the incarceration of key movement functionaries expose the extent to which the State machinery has acted in defence of corporate mining interests while trampling upon constitutional safeguards meant to protect communities in the Scheduled Areas.