On 28 May, tribal rights activist Father Stan Swamy was finally shifted to Mumbai’s Holy Family Hospital for medical treatment on the order...
On 28 May, tribal rights activist Father Stan Swamy was finally shifted to Mumbai’s Holy Family Hospital for medical treatment on the orders of the Bombay High Court. However one cannot forget that the Jesuit priest was in Taloja Jail for over seven months, along with 15 others in the Bhima Koregaon case.
As an older person with serious comorbidities, he has suffered violations of his right to health under Article 12 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the right to live with dignity under Article 6 of the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights as well as the standards articulated under the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, (also known as the Nelson Mandela Rules)
It bears noting that the trial of Swamy and his co-accused has not begun, nor has the state shown any inclination to begin the trial. It has to be reiterated that it is the accepted position in both international law as well as Indian law that detained persons do not lose their right to health and well as the right to live with dignity on imprisonment.
This core principle of the inherent right to dignity of prisoners is embodied in Rule 1...
