By TwoCircles.net Staff Reporter
A petition on Change.org has been launched to demand justice for Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar, a doctor and the author of book “The Adivasi Will Not Dance”, who was suspended by his employers, the Jharkhand government last week for allegedly portraying Santhal women in a bad light.
It says, “The Adivasi will not Dance is about the abuse that Adivasis face in Jharkhand at the hands of law and the people in power. The government of Jharkhand has banned his book and he has been suspended from his job. He has been accused of writing pornographic content.”
It also argued that the book tells the bitter truth of how Adivasis are exploited by everyone because they don’t have a say.
“His book received the prestigious Sahitya Akademi award and yet the government is trying its best to take away his freedom of expression,” the petition says
The petition, addressed to PM Narendra Modi and Government of India, reads, “Please support us so that we can get justice for him and create awareness about how banning any form of media is un-democratic and the first steps towards becoming a dictatorship.”
Shekhar, 34, a doctor based in Pakur, 400 km from Ranchi won the Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar in 2015 for his novel “The Mysterious Ailment of Rupi Baskey”. He was suspended by the government for not taking prior permission to write the book.
The book was published in 2015 and caused a stir among the Santhals. In the first week of August, Shekhar’s effigy and the copies of books were burnt by a group of tribals in Pakur, where he works as a Doctor.
A group of Adivasi writers and academics, who wrote a strong letter protesting the persecution of Shekhar, said they passed the allegedly “pornographic” story around to several Santhal friends. “All of them, without exception, said the story was painful, disturbing and sad, which made them reflect on the difficult, complex lives our Adivasi women live. This story could be about exploitation, choices are borne of desperate conditions or free will, but all it did was evoke tears, a lump in the throat and profound grief. Not one of the readers said the story sexually aroused them,” reads the contents of the letter.
While speaking to TCN earlier this week, Shekhar had said that he didn’t portray Santhal Women in a bad light and didn’t know why the government was after him.