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Rally in London for Binayak Sen

— Photo: AFP

GLOBAL OUTRAGE: A demonstration outside the Indian High Commission in London on Thursday calling for the release of rights activist, Dr. Binayak Sen, being held in a jail in Chhattisgarh on charges of assisting Maoists.

LONDON: A large group of academics, doctors and rights campaigners held a protest outside the Indian High Commission here on Thursday demanding the release of human rights activist Binayak Sen.

Mr. Sen has been languishing in a Chhattisgarh jail for two years over his alleged links with Maoist groups.

The protesters, who came from across Britain, carried placards calling for withdrawal of “false charges” against Dr. Sen and raised slogans such as “Indian democracy shame, shame.”

Intervention sought

A petition urging Home Minister P. Chidambaram to intervene was given to the High Commission, according to a spokesperson of the South Asia Solidarity Group which organised the protest with the Indian Workers’ Association and “Release Binayak Sen Now Campaign” to coincide with the second anniversary of Dr. Sen’s incarceration.

Meanwhile, more British MPs put their names to an Early Day Parliamentary motion expressing concern over the continued detention of Dr. Sen and demanding Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s intervention.

The motion called Dr. Sen’s imprisonment a “grave case of violation of human rights,” and alleged that he was being held on “politically-motivated and trumped-up charges.”

Rights campaigners said that Dr. Sen, who was awarded the 2008 Jonathan Mann Award for Global Health and Human Rights, had been denied a fair trial.

In a statement they denounced his arrest as an attempt to “silence peaceful dissent by imprisoning lawful humanitarian activists on charges of terrorism.”

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