CDRO condemns disinformation campaign against civil rights team

Co-ordination of Democratic Rights Organizations (CDRO)
Press statement
18/04/10
The Coordination Of Democratic Rights Organizations (CDRO) strongly denies the allegation that the eight member human rights team that visited Purbi Singhbhum from 14th -16th April had Maoist links. The team was a CDRO team, an organization of which both PUCL Jharkhand and PUCL national are constituents together with other civil rights organization like APDR, CPDR, APCLC, PUDR, MASS, NPMHR, COHR etc. The fact-finding was organized by PUCL Jharkhand.
The team was inquiring into issues of displacement and the appropriation of national resources in Jharkhand by multinationals, the resistance by people’s movements to such attempts, the procedures employed by the state for the take-over of resources of which Operation Green Hunt is one, and the violation of people’s rights in the process.
The police’s detaining and questioning of the team and the subsequent claims allegedly made by the police in the media about the Maoist links of the fact-finding team are an attempt to destroy the credibility of civil rights organizations. They are aimed at derailing all civil society initiatives intended to discover the truth about the development and displacement especially in Operation Green Hunt areas like the mineral-rich state of Jharkhand . Such campaigns of disinformation against civil rights organization have become a regular feature of the state’s attempt to repress civil rights activity. CDRO strongly condemns this trend.
Asish Gupta
Co-ordinator
CDRO
[Constituent organizations: APDR (West Bengal), APCLC (Andhra Pradesh), CPDR (Maharashtra), AFDR (Punjab), COHR (Manipur), MASS (Assam), NPMHR (Naga areas), PUDR (Delhi), PUCL (National, Rajasthan, Jharkhand, Nagpur), OPDR (Andhra Pradesh), PDF (Karnatka), CPDM (Delhi), Bandi Mukti Committee (West Bengal), PCHR (J&K), LHS (Maharashtra), HRF(Andhra Pradesh).