Cambridge experts study Binayak Sen arrest

London: The plight of Binayak Sen, the social activist slapped with controversial sedition charges, is symptomatic of the problems faced by India's adivasis, Cambridge University researchers studying his case have said.

A study on the case of the Indian public health expert, recently bailed from prison, by Department of Sociology Jonathan Kennedy and Lawrence King researchers has been published in the latest edition of Social Science and Medicine.

They argue that Sen's arrest and imprisonment for sedition should be seen against a broader canvas of the healthcare crisis in tribal areas of India, a university release said.

Sen was released on bail in April while he awaits a retrial in Chhattisgarh, where the paediatrician and human rights activist has worked closely with some of the most disadvantaged and marginalised members of society for more than 30 years.

Kennedy said, "The conviction of Sen provides a prism through which we can analyse broader health crisis issues in the central Indian tribal belt. His arrest illustrates that the state cares more about minerals lying below the ground than the adivasis living above it.

"Sen's conviction and the health crisis among adivasis are not random in distribution or effect, but are symptoms of deeper pathologies of power".

Adivasis, he said, had been increasingly harmed by industrial mining projects.

"The state uses colonial legislation such as the Land Acquisition Act to dispossess them of their land and sell it to mining companies, both Indian and foreign," the researcher said.

"However, the state has been far less active in providing the benevolent functions of the state, such as healthcare, education, development assistance and a functioning legal system," he said.

"In contrast, the programmes Sen set up have helped reduce mortality rates, in the case of malaria by 80 per cent in seven years," Kennedy added.

He said "exploitative power structures" carried over from British rule continue to determine the relationship between adivasis and non-adivasis in independent India.