Monday, 15 June 2020
Time: 1pm to 2pm
Online at: http://www.facebook.com/socialistpartyindia
(if you prefer to join on Zoom, please email socialistpartymedia@gmail.com)
PANEL:
- Sanjay Singh, MP (Rajya Sabha) | Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)
- Manoj Jha, MP | Rashtriya Janta Dal
- Pankaj Pushkar, former MLA (AAP)
- Shivakant Gorakhpuri, General Secretary, VPI (who was kidnapped last month in Nagaland)
- Ved Pratap Vaidik, senior journalist, political analyst & columnist
- Dr Sandeep Pandey, Vice President, Socialist Party (India)
Bharat Gandhi, leader of Voters Party International, was arrested on 13 March, 2020 from a cadre meeting in Dimapur of VPI along with Chuki Haralu, party’s Nagaland coordinator, Prajit Basumatary, Security Chief of the party and three other security volunteers. While others were released after some interrogation and making them sign on a piece of paper by police from Dimapur East police station, Bharat Gandhi was illegally held for 10 days by police before being sent to judicial custody after being booked under sections 419, 420, 468, 471 of IPC.
We demand that Bharat Gandhi’s safe return to Delhi or Lucknow should be ensured in the security of some Central Security Forces and any attempt to kidnap him for ransom must be prevented by the Nagaland government.
We would also like to make it clear that VPI is not in a position to pay any kind of ranson as it is a party not financed by some capitalists but runs on donations from ordinary people.
Bharat Gandhi got bail on 11 May, 2020 from High Court bench in Kohima as the police was not able to file a chargesheet which shows they have not been able to prove that VPI or Bharat Gandhi are cheating people or are commiting any kind of fraud. By putting him in jail Nagaland government has violated his Constitutional and democratic rights. His party colleagues, Shivakant Gorakhpuri and Naveen Kumar, who went to secure his release were kidnapped from a Dimapur hotel on 19 May and taken to a camp of an insurgent group where a demand to pay Rs. 1 crore was made to them. When they expressed their inability to pay they were finally released on 27 May but on the condition that they will pay Rs. 32.5 lakhs within a week.
For more information, please contact:
Dr Sandeep Pandey
Vice President, Socialist Party (India)
05222355978,
