UP: Thousands of mentally ill people chained in sheds

Agencies
January 3, 2019

New Delhi, Jan 3: People with psychological disorders shackled like cattle, their feet tied with iron chains and padlocked for days, months and years- this is the sight at a dirty shed in Uttar Pradesh's Badaun where men and women, young and old, suffering from mental illnesses are kept and abused.

The heart-wrenching incident came to light after a lawyer, a resident of South Delhi filed a petition in the Supreme Court seeking the enforcement and protection of civil, political and fundamental rights of an underprivileged and deprived section of society.

Advocate Gaurav Kumar Bansal believes that "chaining and restraining, confining of persons with mental illness in Faith-Based Mental Asylum shows that there is a huge gap in providing mental health and treatment to the needy in our country."

"Persons with mental illness are subjected to high level of discrimination because of States and Union Territories have failed to break the stigma, whether religious, social, political, associated with persons with mental illness," adds Bansal.

Taking cognisance of the issue, the Supreme Court bench headed by Justice A K Sikri directed Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath led BJP government to take requisite actions in order to provide mental healthcare and treatment at the earliest.

"It is a matter of serious concern and is against the provision of rights of a person under Article 21 of the Constitution. The dignity of such persons can't be compromised," said the bench.

According to Article 21, every person with mental illness shall not only have a right to live with dignity but shall be protected from cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.

In India, the World Health Organisation estimates 2,443 disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) per 100,000 population are lost a year, while the age-adjusted suicide rate per 100,000 population is 21.1. The economic loss due to mental health conditions in India has been pegged at 1.03 trillion of 2019 US dollars for the period 2012-2030.

Mental health workforce in India (per 100,000 population) include psychiatrists (0.3), nurses (0.12), psychologists (0.07) and social workers (0.07). On a closer look, along with India, another country-Indonesia too is struggling to end human shackling.

In 2016, Human Rights Watch exposed shackling of as many as 18,000 psychosocially disable people. The administration has taken a vow to curb such menace by raising awareness and providing medical health services to the needy. However, at present, more than 12,800 people are still shackled-to beds, cement blocks, or in animal pens.

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News Network
March 11,2020

Mar 11: Thirteen of the 22 rebel MLAs in Madhya Pradesh have given an assurance that "they are not leaving the Congress", senior party leader Digvijaya Singh said on Thursday while expressing confidence that the Kamal Nath-led government in the state will win a floor test.

"We are not keeping quiet. We are not sleeping," Singh told PTI, a day after Congress leader from the state Jyotiraditya Scindia quit the Congress and 22 MLAs submitted their resignations from the assembly in Madhya Pradesh.

Scindia was offered the post of Madhya Pradesh deputy chief minister but wanted his nominee, Singh said. However, Kamal Nath refused to accept a "chela", he said.

Scindia, he said, could have been a Congress nominee to the Rajya Sabha but "only Modi-Shah" can give a Cabinet post to the "over-ambitious" leader.

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News Network
July 4,2020

Maryland, Jul 4: The total number of coronavirus cases worldwide has touched 11 million, according to the latest data by the Johns Hopkins University on Saturday.
More than 523,613 people have died globally due to the infection, according to the data compiled by the university.

Though the virus is believed to have emerged from the Chinese city of Wuhan, the United States is the worst-hit country from COVID-19, which was declared as a pandemic by the WHO on March 11.

At least 129,275 people have died in the US from the coronavirus, according to Johns Hopkins University's latest tally.
There are at least 2,786,178 cases of the disease in the country. The US has the highest number of cases in the world.

The second worst-hit country is Brazil, which has reported 1,496,858 lakh cases. The country's death toll stands at 61,884.

The countries around the world including the US, India, Denmark, and Italy have started the process of lifting the lockdown by easing restrictions despite the number of cases continues to rise.

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News Network
January 7,2020

New Delhi, Jan 7: The Delhi Police has filed an FIR against JNUSU president Aishe Ghosh and 19 others for allegedly attacking security guards and vandalising the server room of the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) on January 4.

The police registered the FIR on January 5.

In the complaint filed by the JNU administration, the University alleged that the accused were involved in physical violence and pushed the women guards, verbally abused them and threatened them of dire consequences if they opened the lock of university's communication and information (CIS) office.

"They illegally trespassed the University property with the criminal intention to damage the public property. They damaged servers and made it dysfunctional. They also damaged fiber optic power supplies and broke the biometric systems inside the room," the University officials alleged.

This incident allegedly occurred a day before Aishe Ghosh, other JNU students and teachers were attacked by a masked mob inside the campus.

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