Father Stan Swamy, the 83-year-old jailed priest, has been selected for an award honouring the late Mukundan C. Menon, journalist and founder of the human rights organisation People’s Union for Civil Liberties.
The award, which includes a cash prize of Rs 25,000 and a citation, “is in recognition of people’s struggle for democratic and human rights of Adivasis led by Father Stan Swamy”, the award organisers have written, according to sources close to the arrested Jesuit priest.
Sources said the award would be sent to Swamy at Taloja prison in Navi Mumbai, where the Parkinsonism patient has been lodged following his arrest by the anti-terror agency NIA from his Ranchi home on October 8.
The money will be sent to Bagaicha, the organisation set up by Swamy in Ranchi.
Swamy is accused of Maoist links and has been arrested in the Bhima Koregaon case along with 15 other rights activists, lawyers and writers.
“We were communicated about the selection of Father Stan Swamy for the award, which was instituted by the National Confederation of Human Rights Organisations (NCHRO) in honour of Menon in 2006,” said Father David Solomon, a close associate of Swamy.
“The annual award is given to human rights defenders, artists, writers and environmental activists involved in defending the rights of the people.”
Menon, a human rights activist for more than 35 years, was the first general secretary of the NCHRO.
“The selection was done by a jury that included J. Devika (Thiruvananthapuram), Ibnu Soud (Chennai), Amit Bhattacharya (Calcutta), N.P. Chekutty (Kozhikode) and advocate Jaya Vindhyala (Hyderabad) after considering many nominations received from across the country,” said a Ranchi-based Jesuit priest, who said he had learnt about the selection on Tuesday.
Swamy has spent more than four decades campaigning for tribal rights in Jharkhand.
He has questioned the authorities’ failure to implement the Fifth Schedule of the Constitution, which stipulates the establishment of a Tribal Advisory Council, with exclusively tribal members, for the protection, well-being and development of tribal communities.
A campaign Swamy had launched under the banner of the Jharkhand Organisation Against Uranium Radiation (Joar) had stopped the construction of a tailing pond to store uranium waste in Jadugora, East Singhbhum, which would have displaced tribal families.
Swamy had continued to work for the welfare of displaced people in Bokaro, Santhal Pargana and Koderma.
In 2014, he came under the state machinery’s radar after compiling and publishing a report on the plight of tribal youths falsely linked to Maoists, arrested and left to languish in jail.
Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren and non-BJP Opposition parties have condemned Swamy’s arrest and demanded his release.