Pratibha Patil or Bhairon Singh Shekhawat – whoever wins the presidential poll on July 19 may find huge piles of postcards from across the world waiting for him or her in the Rashtrapati Bhavan. And all the postcards will carry just one appeal to the next President – “Scrap the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA)”.

A South Korean human rights organisation is all set to launch a postcard campaign to express solidarity with Irom Sharmila Chanu — the icon of Manipur’s struggle against the AFSPA — and mount pressure on New Delhi to do away with the draconian law.

Gwangju Award
The ‘May 18 Memorial Foundation’ of South Korea has recently honoured Sharmila – now in her mid-30s – with the prestigious ‘Gwangju Award’ for her unrelenting fight against the AFSPA, which the human rights activists alleged that it provide the security forces ‘a license to kill’.

The organisation has now planned to rope in human rights activists around the world and launch a campaign against the AFSPA.

“The May 18 Memorial Foundation is making a global appeal to the campaigners and defenders of human rights and civil liberties to send postcards to the President of India requesting him/ her to repeal the black law called AFSPA,” said Babloo Loitongbam of Imphal-based Human Rights Alert.

The AFSPA grants laissez-passer to the central armed forces’ personnel to pick anybody merely on suspicion. Even a non-commissioned officer can shoot to kill people, if he feels it is necessary. The Act also provides a sort of legal immunity to the soldiers, even if they commit excesses while combating militancy. The Act has since long been in force in militancy-hit Manipur.

Act misused
“We are trying to tell the world how this draconian law is being misused by the security-men to torture and often kill the innocent civilians in the name of combating militancy,” said Loitongbam.

The Gwangju Award was instituted to commemorate a historic uprising against military rule at the South Korean city of Gwangju on May 18, 1980. Nearly 200 pro-democracy activists were killed, as the then ruler Chun Doo-hwan ordered a military crackdown to quell the rebellion by students and civil militias.

The ARC headed by M Veerappa Moily recently recommended that the AFSPA be repealed immediately.