Concern over denial of visas to NBA's supporters

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, AUG. 3. With the Government reportedly denying visas to three foreigners who had expressed solidarity with the Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA), human rights and anti-bomb activists in the country are once again up in arms over the efforts of the administration to contain the flow of information and suppress the freedom of expression.

According to NBA activists, three foreign nationals - who had wanted to participate in the monsoon satyagraha of the anti-dam movement - had been denied visas. One of them, Ms. Ali Sauer - a Canadian citizen who had visited the Narmada Valley last year - was deported from the country within an hour-and-a- half of landing here.

Apparently, Immigration officials indicated that her association with the NBA was the reason for packing her off. According to Mr. Prashant Bhushan, a lawyer for the NBA in the Narmada dam case, ``she was told that they had instructions to cancel her visa and she heard them mentioning NBA''. Apart from Ms. Sauer's presence in the Narmada valley last year, her article on the environmental aspects of the Sardar Sarovar Dam in the Economic and Political Weekly, it is said, is being cited by the powers that be as evidence of her being a ``threat to national security''.

Two other foreign nationals were denied visas by India's diplomatic missions in their respective countries. While one of them - Ms. Nikki Warwick from Australia - took part in the satyagraha in 1999, the other never visited the Narmada Valley. Still, Ms. Annie Leonard, an American activist, is reported to have been quizzed about her links with Narmada during the visa interview before being denied permission to travel to India.

Unhappy at the way in which the foreign activists were being treated by the Government, several human rights and anti- bomb activists and writers have got together to raise a collective voice against such ``paranoid'' measures. Apart from issuing statements articulating their angst, they are also using the Internet to mobilise support for their cause.

Among those who have already expressed solidarity with the cause are the member of Parliament, Mr. Kuldip Nayar; the social reformer, Mr. Asghar Ali Engineer; the former Chairman of the National Book Trust, Mr. Sukumar Azhikode; the eminent writer, Mr. U. R. Ananthamurthy; the documentary film-maker, Mr. Anand Patwardhan; and the anti-nuke activist, Mr. Praful Bidwai.

The signatories to the statement feel similar action was taken only during the Emergency when the Government did not want its ``dubious human rights record'' to be exposed to the outside world. Wary of democratic India being turned into a fascist regime, Mr. Bhushan said the denial of visas was in line with the campaign ``orchestrated by the Gujarat Government to get the Centre to ban the NBA''.

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