: Authorities in India must build on the central government’s
decision to decriminalize suicide by dropping all charges of attempted suicide
against Prisoner of Conscience Irom Sharmila and releasing her immediately and
unconditionally, Amnesty International India said today. Irom Sharmila has been
held in detention in Manipur for over 14 years on repeated charges of attempted
suicide. She has been on a hunger strike since November 2000 demanding the
repeal of the draconian Armed Forces (SPECIAL
Powers) Act (AFSPA).On 10
December, India’s Minister of State for Home Affairs stated in the upper house
of Parliament that the central government had decided to repeal Section 309 of
the Indian Penal Code, which makes attempting to commit suicide punishable with
imprisonment for up to one year.
“The Indian government’s decision to decriminalize suicide is
in line with an increasing global trend. This move should lead to the immediate
release of Irom Sharmila, who has been held in detention merely for exercising
her freedom of expression in a peaceful manner,” said Shailesh Rai, Programme
Director at Amnesty International India. She has never been convicted of
attempting to commit suicide. She has been regularly released after completing
a year in judicial custody, only to be re-arrested shortly after as she
continues her fast. In August 2014, a Manipur court had ruled that there were
no grounds to charge Irom Sharmila with attempted suicide and instead described
her protest as a ‘political demand through lawful means’, a belief thousands of
her supporters have long held. Irom Sharmila was released after the verdict but
she was re-arrested in farcical circumstances just two days later on the same
charges. “Irom Sharmila should not have been arrested in the first place. Now
that authorities have acknowledged that attempting to commit suicide should not
be considered a crime, authorities in Manipur and Delhi should drop all charges
against her, and start to engage with the issues this remarkable activist
is raising,” said Shailesh Rai.
Background----Irom Sharmila has been on a prolonged hunger strike for over
14 years, demanding the repeal of the Armed Forces (SPECIAL
Powers) Act (AFSPA). She was arrested
by the Manipur police shortly after she began her hunger strike on 2 November
2000, and charged with attempting to commit suicide – a criminal offence under
Indian law. In March 2013, a Delhi court also charged Sharmila with attempting
to commit suicide in October 2006, when she staged a protest in Delhi for two
days. In February 2012, the Supreme Court of India observed in its ruling in
the Ram Lila Maidan Incident case that a hunger strike is “a form of protest
which has been accepted, both historically and legally in our constitutional
jurisprudence.” The British Medical Association, in a briefing to the World
Medical Association, has clarified that, “[a] hunger strike is not equivalent
to suicide. Individuals who embark on hunger strikes aim to achieve goals
important to them but generally hope and intend to survive.” This position is
embodied by the World Medical Association in its Malta Declaration on Hunger
Strikers.
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