We will like to know who all - who lives in Assam does not
mm
From: "Bartta Bistar" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: AssamNet <[email protected]>
Subject: [Assam] Assam must stand in SOLIDARITY with Sharmila in herhumanitarian resolve keeping in mind that the AFSPA(1958) isapplicable on Assam too.
Date: Thu, 5 Oct 2006 13:06:36 +0100
Manipur fight reaches Delhi
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1061005/asp/nation/story_6829536.asp
KHELEN THOKCHOM & NISHIT DHOLABHAI
Sharmila in New Delhi on Wednesday. (Reuters)
Oct. 4: Manipur's most persistent crusader against the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, Irom Sharmila, slipped out of Imphal unnoticed barely 12 hours after being freed from police custody and dramatically resurfaced in New Delhi to turn her "regional" campaign into a "national" one.
Embarrassed police officials admitted that they had no inkling of the plan to "smuggle out" Sharmila, who has been on intermittent hunger strike since 2000. Chief minister Okram Ibobi Singh also pleaded ignorance.
Security personnel at Imphal airport did not recognise the crusader sure to be counted among the most famous faces of Manipur when she, her elder brother Singhajit Singh and two rights activists boarded the 9.15 am flight to the capital.
Sharmila was freed from the Jawaharlal Nehru Hospital, where she had been forcibly fed liquids through a nose-pipe, at 5.45 pm yesterday. An Imphal court had handed her an extended one-year jail sentence on charges of trying to commit suicide.
On reaching New Delhi today, the poet-turned-crusader visited Rajghat to lay a wreath at Mahatma Gandhi's samadhi. Sharmila then proceeded to Jantar Mantar to continue her hunger strike.
"I want to tell the people of India that if Mahatma Gandhi were alive today, he would have launched a movement against the armed forces act. My appeal to the citizens of the country is to join the campaign against the army act," she said.
Sharmila's crusade against the act, a piece of legislation seen by many as a licence for the army to run riot during counter-insurgency operations, began when she was 28.
The trigger for her campaign was the death of 10 civilians in firing by Assam Rifles personnel at a bus stop near Imphal airport on November 2, 2000. The soldiers opened fire on civilians in retaliation after an attack by militants
Aradhana Sharma
Watch storyhttp://www.ndtv.com/template/template.asp?category=National&template=manipurcrisis&slug=Manipur+activist+visits+Gandhi+samadhi&id=94267&callid=1
Wednesday, October 4, 2006 (New Delhi):Sharmila Channu, the face of Manipur's struggle against the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, has finally been released.
Sharmila has been on a hunger strike for six years except the times she was force-fed in jail. She went on a hunger strike in November 2000 after ten people were shot by the army in Malom, a small town in Manipur.
She was arrested and taken to a government hospital in Imphal. On Tuesday her jail remand finally expired and she is now back to her cause.
"I want to continue to talk about justice for the people," she said.
Her fasting and her time in jail may have taken a toll on her health but not on her resolve.
On Wednesday she visited her idol Mahatma Gandhi's samadhi. She is now continuing her strike at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi.
"Gandhiji taught us many things. I want to remind people and all the corrupt politicians of all that he said," said Sharmila.
Nominated for the Nobel peace prize in 2005, Sharmila has been the crux of Manipur's struggle to repeal the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, which gives the army sweeping powers in the state.
Even today Sharmila continues with her quiet and unequal battle against the establishment.
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