India as a humane democracy stood significantly diminished on the afternoon of July 6, when a staunch defender of Adivasi rights breathed h...
India as a humane democracy stood significantly diminished on the afternoon of July 6, when a staunch defender of Adivasi rights breathed his last breath in a hospital in Bandra, Mumbai. At the time of his death, the 84-year-old Jesuit priest Stanislaus Lourduswamy, popularly known as Father Stan Swamy, was still in judicial custody, charged under the anti-terror law, the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act, 1967, with participating in a Maoist conspiracy to foment caste violence and assassinate India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
In the last words he spoke (through a video link) to the judges of the Mumbai High Court, in a still unwavering voice, he said that his health had declined to such a degree that all he wished was to be allowed to be among his “own”, otherwise he would surely die, and possibly very soon. He had no close relatives; the Jesuit priests in his Ranchi ashram Bagicha were his brothers, and the Adivasi youth whose rights he fought so bravely for were his daughters and sons. He did die, 46 days later, alone on his hospital bed in Mumbai.
Fr Stan Swamy was a gentle, fearless warrior for Adivasi rights, braver, more resolute, more determined than most I know. He...
