Human rights activists seek police help

Winner of the Gwangju Human Rights Award (2007) and Weimar’s Human Rights Award (2010), activist Lenin Raghuvanshi on Monday said he was facing death threats for taking up the case of Sapna Chaurasia, a resident of Varanasi.

Winner of the Gwangju Human Rights Award (2007) and Weimar’s Human Rights Award (2010), activist Lenin Raghuvanshi on Monday said he was facing death threats for taking up the case of Sapna Chaurasia, a resident of Varanasi.

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Addressing a press conference with his wife, human rights activist Shruti Nagvanshi at the UP Press Club, Lenin said, “Sapna has faced a lot of torture by her husband Sunil Gupta. We took up her case and took the legal route to fight it, yet we were issued death threats by people. On April 23, some unidentified persons even fired at me, where I could have died.”

The couple has appealed to the state’s top police officials to intervene in the role of Varanasi police in the case. “We have written to the human rights commission and also to the director general of UP police. Now the ball is in their court and I hope they take the case seriously,” said Shruti. “Not just attacks but Sunil Gupta even tried to damage Shruti’s reputation by creating a fake facebook profile in her name,” said Lenin.

The couple has appealed to the state government to make sure the state police acted tough against offenders.