JAMIA MILLIA ISLAMIA

( central university by an Act of Parliament )

Rise of populist possess dangerous threat to

human rights in south Asia and peril of
refugee livelihood

Submitted by Submitted to
Pranav shrivastava Dr. Noorjahan Momin
B.A.LL.B(hon) S.F Assistant Professor
ID. 20178932 International Humanitarian Law
JAMIA MILLIA ISLAMIA
 Law reaches its finest moment when it is been free from unlimited
discretion of ruler

Justice William douglas

When a man place themselves in the society , Every man and woman in the society always
possess special character themselves in society that they are embodied themselves from their
social contract. Just take an example ,place two person having different identity on same
platform how both of them enjoying their rights or both of them possess equal rights or there
any methodology available for enforcing their rights . question how both of individual enjoying
their rights .before answering this question we need to look out the concept of rights and its
significance to human existence how it act as a tools for for fight social peril.

Human rights is the supreme manifestation of human civillisation

and culture and is now lingua franca of global moral thoughts . it is
eternal value of constitutionalism

Justice DY Chandrachud
The position of individual transform after second world war has been one of the most
remarkable development in contemporary International law. The character of the united Nation
by using the words people of the United Nation in the preamble has given a place of importance
to individuals in the domain of International law . while a few rules are directly concerned with
regulating the position and activities of individuals, a few others, indirectly affect them.That is
rules may also be applicable to certain inter-relationship of individuals themselves, where such
inter-relationship involve matters of international concern. Possession of the rights and duties
by the individual being dependent upon the states has made their position weaker than the
state in international plane .They do not possess all the rights and duties recognized by

International 1law. They possess only few of them . and therefore , they possess restricted or

limited capacity in contrast to unlimited or full capacity which is possessed by states having

endowed most of the rights and duties , if not all, by the

1 Dr H.o Agrawal , Human Rights( Central Law Publication, Allahabad , 16 edition , 2018)
I.P Massey, Administrative Law ( Eastern Book Company , Lucknow, 9th edition , 2017)
rules of international law have unlimited personality that is they have full capacity ,
individual have restricted personality since they perform only a few rights and duties.
Human rights is one of such rights which has been conferred to individuals by the state in
modern international Law.

Justice JS verma once stated that human dignity is quintessence of human being. According
to Dictionary quintessence means the most perfect and typical example of class . dignity is
like a regulator of individual status quo , but if the dignity is been segregated by the state
itself then it automatically open window for evil tendency political force which always trying
to create an echo in society through media, institution,social platform where people
themselves submit their consent ( specially majority) and approve evil tendency of state and
the whole system become deceased it become a silent killer of democratic establishment
where people themselves start vanishing their dignity and every action of the state become
unrestrictable .

Never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was legal in eye
of Germany population

Martin luther king

Machinery between Individual and the state start rusting from the Hitler but now in current
situation it reshape into vacuum cleaner of liberty. Hitler just ignite the flame of cultural
clash but now the whole world start running with the torch of populism , fascism which
silently dismantling or block the core supply of democratic machinery. Populism or fascism is
not one process that when awake next morning it shift into long process , it is gradual
process which firstly attack religious , cultural and social figure of a society .

Populism refers to a range of political stances that emphasise the idea of "the people" and
often juxtapose this group against "the elite". The term developed in the 19th century and has
been applied to various politicians, parties, and movements since that time, although has rarely
been chosen as a self-description. Withinand other social science, several different
definitions of populism have been employed, with some scholars proposing that the term
be rejected altogether. Populism always trying to undermine independent institution ,
media and judiciary.

Before starting about populism I need to elaborate the fuel of populism and what are its
symptom.

What driving populism:

Populism is an attractive to many people due to diverse culture , immigrant ,terrorism

populist mainly are well skilled and trying to implant a kind of fear in people that this this
might harm you and for this we all come together and through gate of nationalism they are
trying to capture all the state machinery with help of democratic process. Populist generally
trying to influence majority and alienate minority and certain groups and say these are the
cause of social cause or problem. P hungtington in his hypothesis clash of civilisation that
the next war is not between the countries it will between the culture and religion , when
different religion came into conflict.

Populism is usually studied by looking at the electoral and rhetorical strategies of parties
considered to be populist . starting before populism in south asia and human rights I would
like to portray a short data on demographic profile of south asia countries. Geography as
well as Demography of south asia always hold a unique character its political eco system and
behaviour of individual as well as state . cultural diversity of south asia has always counter
with plethora of peril which might be inject due to cultural conflict in these society.

Symptoms of Populism

• Subjugation of minorities
• Independence of judiciary and media threaten
• Democratic institution targeted
• Suppression of free voice
• Weak opposition
 • Making their own way of nationalism

Demography of south Asian Countries

India

Hinduism 79.8

Islam 14.23

Christianity 2.32

Populist force in society endorse a general tendency to make a slab where populist leader
making false promise in society and populist leader ignite flame of hatred against minority .
Chief Justice of India
Ranjan Gogoi said the rise of Populism Present a Challenge to independence of court and
asked the Judiciary to stand up to populist forces and protect constitutional ethos.
Adressing Chief Justice and judges of Sco Countries., CJI Gogoi referred to the growing trend
of populists disparaging judges as the "unelected who overturn acts of elected majority"
and said: "To some critics and naysayers, this situation presents a case for hoisting the
classical counter narrative - unelected judges, acting under the constitutional mandate, get
to overturn the acts of the elected majority. However, it is for us to recollect that such
situations across the world have heaped tremendous pressure on judicial organs, and it is
no surprise that in some jurisdictions, judiciary too has succumbed to populist forces."

Evolution

India has been the crucible of several types of populism over time. Populist political forces
have played significant roles in Indian politics, and have varied in their vision of political
community, in the social groups they targeted, policies they pursued, and in their impact on

democracy. In the 1960s, it saw the rise of peasant populism, an ideology tha t erased

2 Jan Werner muller , What is populism ( Penguin Publication ,2016)

 class differentiation to promote a rural people vs. urbanites divide. The 1965 Indo-Pak
war gave birth to war-centric nationalism under a populist slogan (coined by Lal Bahadur
Shastri,the then Indian Prime Minister) Jai Jawan Jai Kisan(Long Live the Soldier, Long
Live the Farmer)!The Indian National Congress carried forward this populist spirit in a
new form under Indira Gandhi’s leadership from the late 1960s to the early 1980s.
Inventing the popular slogan, GaribiHatao (Drive Away Poverty), she nationalised banks
and coal, and abolished privy purses, enjoyed by the heirs of former princely states, and
thus secured the support of the Left. In the mid-1970s, after the proclamation of the
controversial National Emergency, she launched a series of targeted pro-poor
programmes, popularised as the 20-point programme. In fact, she became a socialist
voice of the nation under the slogan indira is India.Authoritarianism and s ocialisti public
policies went together. This was the first time when the role of government and policies
emerged as crucial elements in the evolution of populist politics. In course, the
authoritarian presence in populist politics has turned extreme right direction, raising the
slogan, Sab ka sath , Sab ka vikash (With All, Development for All), and while excluding
from “all” – the people - Muslim and Christian minorities, dalits, and several other
groups by highlighting a“total” Hindu identity over the caste, linguistic or regional
identities of these communities.

Human rights and Populism in india

In 2018, the government has harassed and at times prosecuted activists, lawyers, human
rights defenders, and journalists for criticizing authorities. Draconian sedition and
counterterrorism laws were used to chill free expression. Foreign funding regulations were
used to target nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) critical of government actions or
policies. The government failed to prevent or credibly investigate growing mob attacks on

religious minorities, 3marginalized communities, and critics of the government—often

carried out by groups claiming to support the government. At the same time, some senior
BJP leaders publicly supported perpetrators of such crimes, made inflammatory speeches
against minority communities, and promoted Hindu supremacy and ultra-nationalism, which

3 Human rights watch, India : Kashmiri’s Arbitrarily detained ( September ,2016)

encouraged further violence. Lack of accountability for past abuses committed by security
forces persisted even as there were new allegations of torture and extrajudicial killings,
including in the states of Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Haryana.

The Supreme Court decriminalized homosexual sexual relations, striking down a colonial-era
law, paving the way for full constitutional protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and
transgender (LGBT) people.

❖ Impunity for security force

❖ Dalit , tribal and minorities
❖ Women
❖ Freedom

Impunity for security force

There were repeated allegations of violations by government forces in Jammu and Kashmir
during security operations. In 2018, there was increased violence involving militants that
many attributed to political failures to ensure accountability for abuses. Militants killed at
least 32 policemen in 2018. In August, in retaliation for the arrest of their relatives, militants
in South Kashmir kidnapped 11 relatives of several policemen. The militants released all
relatives of police personnel after authorities released the family members of the militants.
In November, militant group Hizbul Mujahideen killed a 17-year-old boy in Kashmir on
suspicion that he was a police informer, and released the video of the killing as a warning to
others. Militants killed several other people in 2018 on suspicions of being police informers.
In June, unidentified gunmen killed prominent journalist Shujaat Bukhari, editor of the
Rising Kashmir, outside the newspaper’s office in Srinagar.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights released its first-ever
report on the human rights situation in Kashmir in June. The report focused on abuses since
July 2016, when violent protests erupted in response to the killing of a militant leader by
soldiers. The government dismissed the report, calling it “fallacious, tendentious and
motivated.”
The report described impunity for human rights violations and lack of access to justice, and
noted that the Armed Forces (Jammu and Kashmir) Special Powers Act (AFSPA) and the Jammu
and Kashmir Public Safety Act (PSA) impede accountability for human rights violations.

The AFSPA, which is also in force in several states in India’s northeast, provides soldiers
effective immunity from prosecution for serious human rights abuses. The government has
failed to review or repeal the law despite repeated recommendations from several
government-appointed commissions, UN bodies and experts, and national and international
rights groups.

In March, in a welcome step, the government removed AFSPA from the northeastern state
of Meghalaya and from 8 out of 16 police stations in Arunachal Pradesh.

In May, police shot at demonstrators protesting a copper plant in Tamil Nadu state, killing
13 people and injuring 100. Police said they were compelled to respond with live
ammunition after demonstrators stoned the police, attacked a government building, and set
vehicles on fire. A fact-finding report by activists and civil society groups said police failed to
follow standard operating procedures for crowd control.

After the BJP formed the government in Uttar Pradesh state, 63 people died in alleged
extrajudicial killings by state police between March 2017 and August 2018. The National
Human Rights Commission and the Supreme Court sought responses from the state
government. The killings in Uttar Pradesh highlighted the lack of accountability for police
abuses and the need for police reforms.

Dalit , tribal and minorities

Mob violence by extremist Hindu groups affiliated with the ruling BJP against minority
communities, especially Muslims, continued throughout the year amid rumors that they
traded or killed cows for beef. As of November, there had been 18 such attacks, and eight
people killed during the year.

In July, the government in Assam published a draft of the National Register of Citizens,
aimed at identifying Indian citizens and legitimate residents following repeated protests and
violence over irregular migration from Bangladesh. The potential exclusion of over four
million people, many of them Muslims, from the register raised concerns over arbitrary
detention and possible statelessness.

Dalits, formerly “untouchables,” continued to be discriminated against in education and in

jobs. There was increased violence against Dalits, in part as a reaction to their more
organized and vocal demands for social progress and to narrow historical caste differences.

In November, farmers protested against debt and lack of state support for rural
communities, and called for establishing rights of women farmers and protecting the land
rights of Dalits and tribal communities against forcible acquisition.

In April, nine people were killed in clashes with police after Dalit groups protested across
several north Indian states against a Supreme Court ruling to amend the Scheduled Castes
and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. In response to a complaint of
alleged misuse of the law, the court had ordered that a senior police official should conduct
a preliminary inquiry before a case is registered under the law. Following the widespread
protests, the parliament passed amendments to the law in August, overturning the Supreme
Court order.

In July, police in Ahmedabad city raided an area, home to 20,000 members of the vulnerable
and marginalized Chhara tribe, a denotified tribe. According to residents, police allegedly
brutally beat up scores of people, damaged property, and filed false cases against many of
them.

A January report by a government-appointed committee on denotified tribes—tribes that were

labeled as criminal during British colonial rule, a notification repealed after independence—said
they were the most marginalized communities, subject to “social stigma,

atrocity and exclusion.”

Tribal communities remained vulnerable to displacement because of mining, dams, and

other large infrastructure projects.
In September, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the biometric
identification project, Aadhaar, saying the government could make it a requirement for
accessing government benefits and filing income tax, but restricted it for other purposes.
Rights groups raised concerns that Aadhaar registration requirements had prevented poor
and marginalized people from getting essential services that are constitutionally
guaranteed, including food and health care.

How its all run in Democratic Establishment?

Populism is not one day process basically it start widening its leg in the political arena of that
society .there intent is very clear to make collective structure of mob power , through the
consent of majoritarian they want to hijack all the sphere of socio political chamber in that
society. The problem arise where institution like judiciary and media are savior of rights are
start shivering due to uncontrollable expansion of populism .populist leader never recognize
the concept of humanitarian law.

Pakistan

There have been very drastic and dramatic social changes in Pakistan. These vital changes
have ushered in a new era of urbanization and the creation of a couple of megacities within
the country. As of 2003, the country became one of the most urbanized cities in all of South
Asia mainly because city dwellers made up about 36 percent of its entire population at that
point. About 50 percent of Pakistani citizens live in a place where at least 5,000 other
citizens reside as well.

Most Pakistani people come from the ancestral group known as the Indo-Iranians. The
largest ethnic group in Pakistan consists of those of Punjabi ethnicity, while Pashtuns and
Sindhis are the second and third largest ethnic groups in the country, respectively. There is a
special mixed ethnic group between the Punjabi ethnicity and the Sindhi ethnicity, and this
group makes up about 10 percent of the entire Pakistani population.
4

Populist Force

Pakistan has again joined the ranks of countries led by a populist politician. The haunting
memory of the previous so-called populist leader of Pakistan (whose credentials as a true
populist were also somewhat dubious) causes much angst among those who declare Khan a
populist. And that angst is not misplaced, however shallow his populist ideology.

I wonder how deep his populism goes. Populists of either right or left have one objective as
their primary aim: to get rid of the establishment and deconstruct the institutions of the
state and reconstruct them in their own image in order to use them to increase their hold
on to power. The fact that Imran Khan ran against the civilian establishment does not prove
his populism is a deeply held belief rather than a convenient political vehicle. If, while in
power, he continues the assault on Pakistan’s increasingly fragile institutions, it may be just
because it is their weakness that helped bring him to power.

Human Rights .

Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party won the highest number of seats in
parliamentary elections in July, and Khan took office as prime minister in August. It was the
second consecutive constitutional transfer of power from one civilian government to
another in Pakistan. In the campaign, Khan pledged to make economic development and
social justice a priority.

Attacks by Islamist militants resulted in fewer deaths in Pakistan in 2018 than in recent
years. However, strikes primarily targeting law enforcement officials and religious minorities
killed hundreds of people. The Taliban and other armed militants killed and injured
hundreds of people in a failed effort to disrupt the elections.

4Malcolm shaw , International law ( Cambridge university press , 7th edn)

3. “ why the populist winning” World Economic Forum , 20 May ,2016
4. “ Rise of Populist possess dangerous threat to judiciary” Times of India , June 19 ,2019
The government continues to muzzle dissenting voices in nongovernmental
organizations (NGOs) and media on the pretext of national security. Militants and
interest groups also threaten freedom of expression through threats and violence.

Women, religious minorities, and transgender people face violent attacks, discrimination,
and government persecution, with authorities failing to provide adequate protection or
hold perpetrators accountable.

Bangladesh

98 Percent of Bangladesh population are with the remaining 2% made up from Biharis and
other ethnic tribes. Minorities in Bangladesh include indigenous people in northern
Bangladesh and the Chittagong Hill Tracts, which have 11 ethnic tribal groups such as the
Chakma, Tanchangya, Kuki, Bawm and Marma. The Mymensingh region is home to a large
Garo population, while North Bengal has a large population of aboriginal Santals. In terms of
religion preferred by the population, we see that Muslim comes in with 89.1% of the
population, Hindu with 10%, and other religions make up the remaining 0.9% (includes
Buddhist, Christian) of the population.

Life expectancy in Bangladesh is currently at 73.4 years of age, with an overall hapiness
ranking of 115 out of all other countries with recorded data

. The accessibility of clean water is still struggling with respective numbers of 13.1% struggling
for clean water and 39.4% struggling to access sanitation. Only 72.8% of the population over 15
years of age is literate, with a GDP expenditure of only 2.5% on education.

Human rights.

Bangladesh authorities detained or jailed senior members of main opposition parties,

lodged politically motivated trumped-up cases against thousands of opposition supporters,
and violated international standards on freedom of speech by cracking down on media

and civil society critical of government abuses.

Despite an international outcry, authorities detained photographer-activist
Shahidul Alam for 107 days. Alam had criticized human rights violations in an interview
with Al Jazeera television and on Facebook in August. Bangladesh also enacted an overly
broad and vague law that affects various forms of speech, particularly through the use of
social media and other internet-based devices.

The government deployed humanitarian, medical, and other services to ensure the safety
and welfare of Rohingya refugees who fled crimes against humanity by the military in
neighboring Myanmar beginning in late August 2017. Bangladesh is now host to nearly 1
million Rohingya refugees, a population which includes both recent refugees and those
who have been there longer. The continued influx of Rohingya refugees from Myanmar is
creating a severe strain on humanitarian and government aid agencies.

April marked the five-year anniversary of the collapse of Rana Plaza garment factory,
leading to the deaths of over 1,100 workers. The prime minister promised that reforms will
continue to ensure the safety of workers but was resistant to continuing to receive external
international oversight through the Bangladesh Accord and the Bangladesh Alliance, which
were set up with the assistance of international brands following the collapse of Rana Plaza .

Populism and its impact on democracy.

In recent times, the socio-political scenes in scores of countries around the world have been
turning toxic. A creeping polarisation among political forces is taking hold, accompanied by a
culture of demonising the adversaries, use of vitriolic and bareknuckle hate rhetoric. The
norms of civility and tolerance are eroding rapidly. A complex array of factors is driving this
venomous trend, with the result that even in countries that had earlier experienced decently
democratic governance, people, especially minority ethno-religious groups, now live in a
stifling atmosphere of insecurity.

Recently, the UN Secretary General Mr Antonio Guterres in his address to the Human Rights
Council in Geneva on February 25 voiced deep disquiet about this trend.

Refugee crisis
Populism is dangerous and puts public health and the economy at risk. But it is hard to
resist. Populist politicians thrive on fake news: it is so much easier to fuel people’s emotions
if you feed them fabricated news of imaginary crises. Particularly the so-called “migrant
crisis , current situation south Asia is endemic to the violation of refugee rights from
rohingya to NRC in Assam and balooch in Pakistan , this figure show how right of stateless
person being crushed with the consent of political machinery.

Rohingya issue

Two-year-old Noor and her family were forced to flee a horrific explosion of violence in
Myanmar last summer.
They were among more than 720,000 Rohingya refugees who arrived exhausted, hungry and
often traumatised at what is now the world’s largest refugee settlement in Cox’s Bazaar,
Bangladesh.
Yet they are still not safe. The dreaded monsoon rains threaten a second catastrophe,
washing away what little they have left and leaving them at risk from landslides and floods.
Noor and her family narrowly avoided being buried alive as a hillside collapsed onto the roof
of their home.

NRC

The NRC was created in 1951 to determine who was born in Assam and is therefore
Indian, and who might be a migrant from neighbouring Bangladesh.

Conclusion
Populism can cause paralysis to whole political system . The contemporary world is
witnessing a tide of democratic recession at the hands of majoritarianism and Populism . in
my view to fight with the evil of populism we need to understand why populism grow , in
my research I find that there are basically five cause which are fuelling populism.

1.They are better organised

2.Populist ignite the thinking of majoritarian.

3.They mainly trying to play with emotion

4.They are creating insecure condition against minority

5. They grasp From root to highest political position

These are the five strategy which populist use . protection of human rights become core
issue in ecosystem of populist state . to clean dust particle of populism we need to make
institution like judiciary , human rights commission as vacuum cleaner . International Human
rights treaties should be embodied in every machinery of the country.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Books

1.Dr H.o Agrawal , Human Rights( Central Law Publication, Allahabad , 16 edition , 2018)

2.I.P Massey, Administrative Law ( Eastern Book Company , Lucknow, 9 th edition , 2017)

3. Jan Werner muller , What is populism ( Penguin Publication ,2016)

4. Malcolm shaw , International law ( Cambridge university press , 7th edn)

Report/Newspaper Articles

1. “ why the populist winning” World Economic Forum , 20 May ,2016

2. “ Rise of Populist possess dangerous threat to judiciary” Times of India , June 19 ,2019
3.