Fr Stan Swamy, an 83-year-old Jesuit priest in India, has been imprisoned on charges of terrorism. However, his supporters say the real reason for his incarceration is that he spoken out for the human rights of indigenous people.
From Earthbeat:
An 83-year-old Jesuit priest imprisoned in India on accusations of terrorism has been targeted because of his defense of indigenous people’s land rights, church and human rights leaders say.
Fr. Stan Swamy, who is from India’s Jamshedpur province, has worked among indigenous people, known collectively in India as Adivasi, for four decades. The Adivasi and Dalits, or “untouchables,” are mainly subsistence farmers and are generally the poorest and most marginalized people in India, Fr. Xavier Jeyaraj, head of the Jesuits’ international Secretariat for Social Justice and Ecology in Rome, told EarthBeat.
In a country that still adheres to a strict caste system, Swamy has defended the land rights of Adivasi people who have been threatened or forced from their homes by mining, industrial agriculture and large-scale infrastructure projects.
He was arrested at his home in Ranchi, the capital of the eastern state of Jharkhand, on the night of Oct. 8, and flown to Mumbai, where he is imprisoned.
Officials of the National Investigation Service claimed he has ties to Maoist rebels and was involved in violence in which a person was killed on Jan. 1, 2018, at an event marking a victory by Dalit people over the ruling class 200 years earlier.
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