Sharmila has not eaten any food voluntarily since November 5, 2000, when she began her protest against an Indian law that suspends many human rights protections in areas of conflict.
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Having broken the world’s longest hunger strike on Tuesday, Manipur’s “Iron Lady” Irom Sharmila is maintaining her resolve not to clip her nails, comb her hair, go to her house and meet her mother till AFSPA is repealed.
Sharmila was granted bail Tuesday after assuring a judge that she planned to end her 16-year fast, although she will remain at the hospital until an official court order comes through. A person who has not eaten solid food for 16 years can not start it suddenly and enjoy a full normal meal.
The lawyer disclosed that Sharmila had been taken to the Imphal hospital where she has been kept for several years and force fed through a nasal tube.
The maximum sentence for attempted suicide is one year.
Sharmila’s close associate, Babloo Loitongbam, said she would oppose army misconduct when she was released from detention on August 23. Assembly elections in the state are due early next year. “I will never forget this moment”, she declared. Without this draconian law (AFSPA) you would be able to connect with us. “And stop violence in this age of globalisation and credo of development for all”, said Sharmila. She was arrested by authorities, forcibly hospitalized and force-fed through a tube in her nose.
Why was she in custody? “They have been seeing me from their own point of view without connecting with what is in my heart”, she added. The Armed Forces Special Powers Act gives forces the right to kill suspected rebels without fear of prosecution and detain militants without warrants. It also gives police wide-ranging powers of search and seizure.
She started her strike in 2000, after 10 civilians were allegedly killed by Indian soldiers in the country’s northeastern Manipur state and has been protesting the killings using her hunger strike ever since.
Amnesty International has called her a prisoner of conscience.
“I need power to remove the black law, ” Sharmila said referring to the immunity provisions.
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Critics of the law say it is used to cover up massive human rights abuses in Manipur, which has suffered a decades-long armed insurgency fighting for independence from India. “It is my personal life and it is natural”.
