Amnesty international is in news of-late due to a police complaint filed by ABVP activists in Bangalore. Amnesty organized an event for few families from Kashmir to share their stories of the loss they suffered at the hands of Indian Army and J&K Police. The event was a follow up of a research paper published by Amnesty “Denied”: Failures in accountability for human rights violations by security force personnel in Jammu and Kashmir in July 2015. The event was planned in Bangalore, Mumbai and Delhi. The Bangalore event was being moderated by Seema Mustafa, a journalist.

Sequence of events

As India was getting ready to celebrate its 69^th anniversary of freedom, this event was organized just before on 13^th of August. Few Kashmiri Muslim families were flown to Bangalore for the event. The plan was to share experiences of ‘human right violations’ faced by those families and then to enact a skit showing an incident of human right violation. R K Mattoo, a journalist was among the panelists to talk about plight of Kashmiri Pandits as well.

When Mr. Mattoo, during the discussion said that Indian army was one of the worlds most disciplined army, there were anti-army slogans raised by Kashmiri Muslim families.

Later towards the end of the event some people shouted slogans for Azaadi (freedom) of Kashmir. ABVP upon learning this, staged protest against Amnesty’s event and also filed a police complaint against the organization. Karnataka Police registered FIR stating sedition as a charge

To the charges that the event indirectly supported terrorists, Amnesty said the only discussion that had taken place was about allegations of human rights violations and the denial of justice to families in Kashmir.

"No Amnesty International India employee shouted any slogans at any point," said the human rights organization in a statement referring to allegations that "slogans were raised that Indian Kashmir should be a part of Pakistan.

Media response

While few TV channels like Zee and Times Now questioned Amnesty on the event and the slogans raised therein, most other channels questioned ABVP and Police for slapping charges of sedition on Amnesty. NDTV as usual went into overdrive in defending Amnesty. In a debate NDTV anchor Nidhi Razdan asked a panelist from ABVP about why he was offended when entire Kashmir was shouting this slogan. She went on to ask if ABVP will put the entire state in jail.  What NDTV was trying to do was to project the act of few rioters as a popular uprising against Indian state in Kashmir. Isn’t it that Pakistan’s line on Kashmir?

Putting things into perspective

The entire focus now is on the sloganeering by few Kashmiri Muslims and the sedition charges slapped by Police on Amnesty. However the plot runs a little deeper than this. Amnesty apparently organized this event as a follow up on the research paper as mentioned earlier. But notice their timing. This is the time when the Kashmir is burning with many cities in Kashmir under curfew. Pakistan is trying to get international community involved by creating a narrative of so called human rights violation. It has even been successful in getting OPEC to issue statement against India on this issue. At such a time what was the need to organize an event which was related to a one year old research paper? Wasn’t it an attempt to put pressure on Indian government which is trying to bring the situation under control in Kashmir?

The participation of the representative from Kashmir’s Pandit community was an afterthought. As R K. Mattoo confirms that his inclusion was a result of his request to be included in the event. Also his participation was confirmed just a couple of hours before the event. Was the original plan to focus only on plight of Kashmiri Muslim families and inclusion of Pandits’ voice was just a balancing act by Amnesty? Probably yes looking at the last minute inclusion of Mr. Mattoo’s and the way his voice was muffled by slogans against Army.

Focusing only on the slogans raised in the event is helping Amnesty however. Now Amnesty is trying to project this as a spontaneous response from the people who have suffered at the hands of Indian government. The questions should be raised and actions should be taken, not on the sloganeering but on the motives of Amnesty.

To understand the real motives of Amnesty one does not have to look any further than their website. If one looks at the so called annual report of 2015/16 on India. The report makes some sweeping statements without any statistics or proof. Sample these opening statements –

“Authorities clamped down on civil society organizations critical of official policies, and increased restrictions on foreign funding. Religious tensions intensified, and gender- and caste-based discrimination and violence remained pervasive. Censorship and attacks on freedom of expression by hardline Hindu groups grew. Scores of artists, writers and scientists returned national honours in protest against what they said was a climate of growing intolerance.”

Which organizations were clamped down for being critical of official policies? Which statistics show increased religious tension? How and when did the “Hardline Hindu groups” attack the freedom of expression? There are supporting facts given in the report for these allegations.  Contrast this with older reports of 2013 and earlier. In 2012 most cases were filed under sec 66A which deals with offensive messages online. It was widely criticized for being an attack on freedom of expression. But as per Amnesty this was not an issue. There was no mention of this in their report of 2012.

There have always been questions on Amnesty’s selective criticism globally. Many are of the opinion that Amnesty ignores human rights violations when done by USA and its allies. When one looks at the selective issues taken up by them, it does indicate some sort of a partisan attitude of the organization. As they say there can’t be smoke without fire.

Therefore one needs to look at the larger issue in the entire Amnesty controversy rather than just focusing on the sloganeering.