'Need to safeguard rights of minorities'

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, December 10

On the occasion of Human Rights Day, the Khalra Mission Organisation (KMO) sought intervention of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in the atrocities against Sikhs and other minorities.

Jagdeep Singh Randhawa of the KMO said the Indian state carried out sacrilege of the Guru Granth Sahib, protected culprits; stopped Muslims from offering Namaz, abolished Article 370 and recently killed 13 civilians in Nagaland. All this points towards continuation of these brutalities. Instead of giving more powers to provinces, they are centralising power to weaken every province in India, he accused.

Darshan Singh and Satwinder Singh Palasaur said the corrupt rulers, by pursuing corporatisation and capital policies deprived 90 percent of Indians of the basic needs of food and shelter. No action has been taken for 3,000-kg drugs recovered from the Mundra Port in Gujarat. All of them appealed intervention for fair investigation of these brutalities.

Meanwhile, a webinar organised by the Regional Public Relations Bureau of the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting on the occasion of Human Rights Day was held today.

Speaking on the occasion, advocate Amandeep Singh Bajwa interpreted the articles of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). A social activist Subhash Sehgal gave a detailed account of the challenges of implementing human rights at the grassroots level. Sapna (IIS), deputy director, Press Information Bureau, Chandigarh, said massive erosion of basic the human rights during World War II had made the world community think about human rights. As a result, the UNO issued the ‘Universal Declaration of Human Rights’ on December 10, 1948. Gurmeet Singh (IIS), Field Publicity Officer in-charge of the Ministry’s Field Outreach Bureau, said the National Human Rights Commission was set up in our country in 1993 to protect human rights. However, since the year 1950, the Constitution of our country has come into force, in Part III of which every Indian has been given many fundamental rights.

Baljit Singh, Assistant Director, Regional Outreach Bureau, Chandigarh, thanked all guests and said human rights could ensure that we achieve a better, more equitable and sustainable world in the future.