ALN is releasing a statement on the work of Bela Bhatia and other lawyer activists defending the rights of indigenous people in Chhattisgarh, India

Bela Bhatia and the Lawyer Defenders of Indigenous People in Chhattisgarh, India

15 July 2025

On 23 January 2017, an angry mob of nearly thirty men swarmed the home of human rights lawyer Bela Bhatia.[1] Arriving on four wheeled vehicles and motorcycles in the dead of night, they barged into her home, threatening to cut her up and kill her dog, and even went after her landlady. The crowd was drunk and disordered, spewing accusations that she was a “Maoist sympathiser,” but their demands to her were clear: leave immediately, or they would burn her house to the ground.[2]

The assault was part of a larger wave of human rights repression in the Indian state of Chhattisgarh, where Adivasis—indigenous peoples in India—have been caught in the crossfire between state security forces and Maoist rebels. Bhatia’s story, as well as her recent writing, encapsulate the accelerating human rights crisis and the root drivers behind India’s unrelenting push to develop at the cost of its most vulnerable inhabitants.

Chhattisgarh is the most heavily militarized state in India, even more than Kashmir, and conditions have only continued to get worse as India has pursued its “Operation Kagar” in a purported bid to wipe out the Maoist group known as the Naxalites.[3] While India presents its militarization activities as an effort to combat left-wing extremism, in practice it is a cover story for enabling state-sponsored corporate land grabs by stripping Adivasis of their land rights.[4] Bhatia is just one of many human rights defenders who have faced harassment and intimidation after exposing the dire effects of militarization and mining on Bastar’s Adivasi community.

The attack on Bhatia’s home in 2017 happened just after she brought to light two instances of gang rape and sexual assault by security forces in Bijapur. Earlier that month, the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), following an investigation that Bhatia had worked on, released a press note alleging Chhattisgarh police had raped and sexually assaulted at least sixteen women in Bijapur. Not long before the mob came knocking at her door, several members of the the Jagdalpur Legal Aid Group and other human rights defenders were also forced to leave Chhattisgarh after similar mob actions.

When fellow human rights defenders contacted the police to report the incident, the police officer they reached initially responded by saying “Very soon Maoists and their dogs will be thrown out of Bastar.” Though police eventually did send forces to Bhatia’s home for protection, they did little to hold back the unruly mob, and no one was ever arrested.

The mob finally left after Bhatia and her landlady signed a declaration saying that she would leave her house. Her landlord and his sons were called into the local police station and told that Bhatia must leave the house immediately, in a move that signaled police complicity in the mob actions.[5]  But though Bathia was forced to leave her house, she never lost the will to fight for justice for the women of Bijapur. Shortly after the assault, defiant and determined, Bhatia wrote an open letter, expressing her conviction to continue fighting for victims of the militarization of Chhattisgarh. “I had come to Bastar to stay,” she wrote. “I will try to remain in the district despite everything that has happened.”

Eight years later, Bhatia has not given up the fight. Even as conditions continue to get worse, she has dedicated her life’s work to speaking out about the plight of the most marginalized groups in India.

On 19 April 2024, Bhatia released a book titled India’s Forgotten Country: A View from the Margins. The book features a catalogue of essays that Bhatia wrote throughout her career as a human rights defender, detailing the plight of the Dalits, Adivasis, bonded labourers, and women of India and the oppressive forces seeking to stamp out their rights. This profile details the life and work of Bela Bhatia, with a focus on her advocacy for Adivasi communities in Chhattisgarh. 

Bela Bhatia’s Life and Work

Bela Bhatia is a human rights lawyer, independent researcher, writer, and Honorary Professor at Tata Institute of Social Sciences in Mumbai. She has worked with Adivasis and Dalits in India for over 30 years. Bhatia grew up in Bihar in the 1960s, and moved to Gujarat in 1975, where began her career as a full time activist for a trade union of agricultural laborers and marginal farmers. She spent two years doing peace and human rights work in Iraq and Palestine in the early 2000s and is the co-author of Unheard Voices: Iraqi Women on War and Sanctions and the co-editor of War and Peace in the Gulf: Testimonies of the Gulf Peace Team.[6]

Bhatia holds a postgraduate degree in social work from Mumbai’s Tata Institute of Social Sciences[7] and did her PhD at the University of Cambridge. Her thesis focused on the Naxalite movement in Bihari and she conducted additional research on the lives of Adivasi and the Dalit and other marginalized groups in India.[8] According to her, she chose this topic because she “wanted to understand why some citizens of a democratic nation were forced to pick up arms against the state.” After finishing her PhD, she worked for the Center for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) and served on a Planning Commission-appointed panel whose task was to examine challenges to governing areas under Maoist rebellion.

Bhatia first came to Bastar for work in 2006 and moved there in 2015 as an independent advocate and researcher. She has taken part in many fact-finding investigations and reports, including the investigations that revealed the gang rapes in Bijapur, where eyewitness accounts suggested the involvement of police and paramilitary personnel—a finding that was backed up the conclusions of several other independent investigations.

The mob that broke into her home was not her only brush with violent retaliation for her advocacy. She received death threats in 2016 during a demonstration against her near her home and was one of the 121 Indians who were targeted on Whatsapp with Israeli cyber-surveillance NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware in 2019.[9]

Bhatia released her book on 19 April 2024. She describes it as a collection of essays written throughout the course of her work across decades. Half of it is dedicated to Bihar and Bastar.[10]

Militarization and Suppression of Adivasi Rights in Chhatisgarh 

While Bhatia has done advocacy for a wide range of causes, the bulk of her life’s work has focused on the situation in the Indian state Chhattisgarh. And she is far from the only human rights defender who has faced an uphill climb in fighting the growing crackdown on human rights in the region.

Chhattisgarh is known to many as a “no activist” land.[11] It is the state with the highest incarceration rates in the country.[12] Lawyers and activists working in this region face a multitude of threats and hurdles to their work, particularly when it comes to land rights and criminal defense. Unlike the rest of India, many towns in Chhattisgarh have hardly any normal Indian Penal Code cases in their criminal justice system—those that deal with crimes such as theft, robbery, sexual assault, and rape. Instead, the bulk of criminal charges in some areas include unlawful assembly with attempt to murder or murder, and the Arms Act. A majority of cases end in acquittal, but these acquittals can take as long as six years. During this time, the accused are held in jail without bail.[13]

According to Bhatia and many others who work with Adivasis, India’s counter-insurgency movement is a cover story for state-sponsored corporate land grabs that have brought about mass displacement and environmental devastation.[14] The rampant militarization of the region has included the establishment of over 250 security camps set up every two to three kilometers, around 100,000 security personnel, effectively one official for every nine civilians, a reward-for-kill system, encouragement of extrajudicial killings, and extensive use of surveillance technologies and Israeli weapons.[15]

Many of the people who get swept up in the criminal justice system in Chhattisgarh are Adivasis protesting the threats to their land rights and calling for just implementation of the law. Adivasis are regularly caught in the crossfire between Maoist rebels and security forces, but while human rights violations by the Naxalites are met with swift government action, it is extremely rare for security personnel or other Indian government officials to face punishment for human rights violations. It is for this reason that Bhatia focuses so much of her activism on violence by security forces: to address what she refers to as “passive repression”—or the government failing to act on people’s complaints or protect their rights, even where the law demands it. It is her refusal to turn a blind eye to the atrocities committed by government forces in the name of security that she is the target of such fierce backlash. 

Many activists and lawyers addressing human rights violations in Chhattisgarh have been arrested or targeted by police-linked vigilante groups. These have included human rights lawyer Sudha Bharadwaj,[16] seven human rights defenders of the Telangana Democratic Front (TD), and activists Suneeta Pottam[17] and Bijendra Korram.[18] At least 30 members of the Moolvasi Bachao Manch (MBM), an Indigenous youth-led land rights movement, were jailed under false charges within the past two years. Additionally, several members of the Jagdalpur Legal Aid Group (JAGLAG), have been pushed out of the region through intimidation of their landlords, who feel compelled to evict their tenants or face threats to their own life. Anyone who speaks out on behalf of Adivasis in the state or provides legal representation for them is likely to be labeled as a Maoist and or Naxalite sympathizer and subsequently targeted by police and other state-sponsored groups.

Other times, the government pushes back through administrative tactics. The Jagdalpur Bar, for instance, passed a resolution ruling that lawyers from outside were not allowed after the JAGLAG legal group was beginning to make progress in their efforts to provide adequate representation to Adivasis in the area.[19]

However, even as activists and lawyers have faced increasing challenges and hurdles, that has not stopped human rights defenders like Bhatia from continuing the fight, namely by raising awareness and building community. Bhatia’s book aims to do so by raising awareness about the people and communities that have been left behind in India’s development. Having witnessed the dire conditions of Adivasis and others firsthand, Bhatia does not shy away from depicting the harsh reality that so many suffer through.  But even amidst all the anguish, her writing contains a clear message of hope.

Violence and Displacement in the Name of Development

One of the most striking elements of Bhatia’s book is that she calls attention to how India’s economic development and the growing inequality it creates encourages complacency among those who benefit the most. And it’s this complacency that enables security forces in Chhattisgarh to perpetuate their narrative. As the lives of many in India continue to improve, the government wants its people to turn a blind eye to the human toll behind the scenes. Bhatia demands that they refuse to do just that.

So long as the government of India pursues its economic development goals by razing its own indigenous communities, it faces the very real risk of missing the forest for the trees. It risks trampling, degrading, and decimating the very people that this development is meant to uplift. Bhatia and her writing serve as an unwavering reminder of this truth. And she is not about to go quiet anytime soon. “It is our right to expose the truth, ask some hard questions, mobilise the masses, inspire them to break their silence and protest within the democratic limits,” she says. “Any healthy democracy must not take away this freedom from its citizens.”

India has made impressive strides in its social and economic development since its independence, and no one doubts that the continuation of this success should continue to be its government’s priority. But as this development drives increasing levels of inequality, it begs the question: whom is this development for?

For Bhatia, the answer is clear. The development of a healthy, democratic country requires that no one be left behind. “Democracy is not merely a system of governance,” she writes.

It is also a value system. The consideration for the misery of fellow citizens lies at the root of democracy. It requires an open atmosphere where everybody can live without fear. Democracy aims for a society where there is no oppressor and the oppressed. It means a society where everybody has freedom of speech. I hope we will be able to establish such a democracy in Bastar.[20]

__________

[1] “Take Action for Bela Bhatia.” Front Line Defenders, 26 Jan. 2017, www.frontlinedefenders.org/en/action/take-action-bela-bhatia.

[2] “Why a Top Indian Activist Is Facing Threats to Her Life.” BBC News, BBC, 20 Feb. 2017, www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-38903571.

[3] The Hindu Bureau. “Government Should Ensure No Innocents Are Killed: CPI(M) Polit Bureau on Operation Kagar .” The Hindu, 4 May 2025, www.thehindu.com/news/national/government-should-ensure-no-innocents-are-killed-cpim-polit-bureau-on-operation-kagar/article69537279.ece.

[4]  ICCA Consortium. “Protection for Bastar Adivasi Communities against State Violence in India: Global Solidarity Demands Urgent Actions.” ICCA Consortium, 23 June 2025, www.iccaconsortium.org/2025/06/22/protection-bastar-adivasi-communities-against-state-violence-india-global-solidarity-demands-urgent-actions/.

[5] Mahaprashasta, Ajoy Ashirwad. “Academic Bela Bhatia Attacked, Threatened in Bastar.” The Wire, 23 Jan. 2017, thewire.in/102194/bela-bhatia-attack-bastar-chhattisgarh/.

[6] “Bela Bhatia.” Penguin Random House India, 24 July 2024, www.penguin.co.in/book_author/bela-bhatia/.

[7] Sharma, Ashutosh. “‘Thousands of Adivasis Are Jailed Under False Charges’: Bela Bhatia on Bastar’s Militarisation and Mining Crisis.” Frontline, 15 Apr. 2025, frontline.thehindu.com/the-nation/adivasi-rights-bastar-militarisation-bela-bhatia/article69399495.ece.

[8] “Bela Bhatia.” Front Line Defenders, 31 Mar. 2016, www.frontlinedefenders.org/en/profile/bela-bhatia.

[9] Wahab, Ghazala, and Bela Bhatia. “Bela Bhatia on Her Book India’s Forgotten Country and Her Life in Bastar.” Force Magazine, 2024, Accessed 4 July 2025.

[10] Ramaswamy, Gita. “A Call to Understand, Feel, and Act.” The India Forum, TheIndiaForum, 28 Feb. 2025, www.theindiaforum.in/book-reviews/call-understand-feel-and-act.

[11] Punwani, Jyoti. “The 27-Year-Old Lawyer Fighting for Adivasis.” Rediff, Rediff.com, 2 Mar. 2016, www.rediff.com/news/special/the-27-year-old-lawyer-fighting-for-adivasis/20160302.htm.

[12] Srivastava, Samar. “Guneet Kaur, Isha Khandelwal and Parijata Bhardwaj: Bringing Law to the Land.” Forbes India, ForbesIndia, 18 Feb. 2015, www.forbesindia.com/article/30-under-30/guneet-kaur-isha-khandelwal-and-parijata-bhardwaj-bringing-law-to-the-land/39601/1.

[13] Bearak, Max. “Shoestring Legal Aid Group Helps Poor in Rural India - The New York Times.” The New York Times, 1 Mar. 2015, www.nytimes.com/2015/03/02/world/shoestring-legal-aid-group-helps-poor-in-rural-india.html.

[14] “Operation Kagar: The War on Adivasis and Their Land.” Liberation, liberation.org.in/detail/operation-kagar-the-war-on-adivasis-and-their-land. Accessed 3 July 2025.

[15] ICCA Consortium. “Briefing: Indigenous Peoples, Local Communities and Area-Based Conservation Targets.” ICCA Consortium, 16 Mar. 2022, www.iccaconsortium.org/2022/03/16/oecm-lbo-brief/.

[16] “Sudha Bharadwaj.” India Civil Watch International (ICWI), indiacivilwatch.org/sudha-bharadwaj/. Accessed 3 July 2025.

[17] Rinchin. “Suneeta Pottam: A Saga of Continued Arbitrary Detention.” People’s Union For Civil Liberties, 1 Mar. 2025, pucl.org/manage-writings/suneeta-pottam-a-saga-of-continued-arbitrary-detention/.

[18] Dussart, Jade. “India: Arbitrary Arrest, Detention and Physical Assault of Environmental HRD Bijendra Korram (Joint Communication).” UN SR Human Rights Defenders, 13 Feb. 2025, srdefenders.org/india-arbitrary-arrest-detention-and-physical-assault-of-environmental-human-rights-defender-bijendra-korram-joint-communication/.

[19] Kumar, Raksha. “In Chhattisgarh, Pressure Mounts on Lawyers Taking up Cases of Tribal Prisoners.” PERSPECTIVE, 8 Jan. 2018, www.rakshakumar.com/features/in-chhattisgarh-pressure-mounts-on-lawyers-taking-up-cases-of-tribal-prisoners/.

[20] Bhatia, Bela. “‘I Will Not Leave Bastar’: Activist Bela Bhatia in an Open Letter | Catch News.” Catch News, 14 Feb. 2017, www.catchnews.com/india-news/i-will-not-leave-bastar-activist-bela-bhatia-in-an-open-letter-1458830718.html.