To

The Prime Minister

Government of India

New Delhi                                                                                           26 January ‘11

Dear Shri Manmohan Singh

We, the undersigned, wish to express our deep concern at the victimisation and unjust
imprisonment of well-known humanitarian and human rights defender Dr Binayak Sen, in
Chhattisgarh.

Both the charge of ‘sedition and conspiracy’ and the verdict,  on 24 December 2010 given by a
Sessions Court in Raipur, sentencing Dr Sen to life imprisonment for are unfair, too extreme and
undermines the credibility of our police and judiciary. While we understand that Dr Sen has the right
to appeal to a superior court we are afraid the long drawn out judicial process itself has become a
punishment on its own for this good doctor.

To arrest a citizen of India on false charges and deliberately subject him to years of custody and legal
wrangles is to make a mockery of the very idea of justice and democracy in the country.

Dr Binayak Sen, it appears, is simply being harassed in a vindictive manner by the Chhattisgarh
government to ‘teach a lesson’ to all human rights activists everywhere. We appeal to you to
intervene in the case, press for a judicial review of the verdict and urgently undo the injustice being
done to Dr Binayak Sen, who has spent over three decades serving the poor in remote parts of
Chhattisgarh.

We also urge your government to completely scrap the law on ‘sedition’, a hangover from the British
colonial period, as it is has no place in any independent and democratic country.

 Sd.-

Sharmila Tagore

Naseeruddin Shah

Aparna Sen

Mahesh Bhatt

Girish Karnad

Rahul Bose
Ratna Pathak Shah

Imaad Shah

Gautam Ghose

Ashok Vajpeyi

M.K.Raina

Gauhar Raza

Anand Patwardhan

Rukmini Bhaya Nair

Ranjit Hoskote

Jerry Pinto

Pankaj Mishra

Murtaza Danish Husain