Sunil Namdeo

Journalist

Chhattisgarh

HRDA issued an urgent appeal to the National Human Rights Commission of India on May 4, 2022, over the demolition of Mr. Sunil Namdeo’s house. The demolition of his legally constructed house is a continuation of harassment meted out to the HRD by government agencies for his stories. 

Mr Namdeo is a senior journalist in Chattisgarh who wrote a series of news reports in 2019 and 2020 alleging that Congress leaders collected bribes and levies from businesses and industries in Naya Raipur. He was jailed for seven months in 2021 after being arrested on four fabricated cases.

On February 19, 2022, around 250-300 workers reached Mr. Namdeo’s house with six JCB machines and a bulldozer at around 8 am and demolished his home. The family was not present when the workers and officials arrived. Mr. Namdeo and his wife reached the spot at around 11 am and pleaded with the officials to allow them to save their valuable belongings and documents, but they were not allowed to do so.

The demolition was carried out despite the Naya Raipur Atal Nagar Vikas Pradhikaran submitting before the Chhattisgarh High Court that it was withdrawing the notices issued against the HRD. 

We believe that the action of the administration is a gross overreach of the powers provided to them and is a direct reprisal for the HRD’s work at exposing corruption by the local administration and the police. We urged the Hon’ble Commission to initiate an independent and impartial investigation into the actions of the Chhattisgarh police.