About AIDS Bhedbhav Virodhi Andolan (ABVA)

[AIDS Anti-Discrimination Movement]

In 1988, a group of Delhi based citizens involved in community work in education, health, law, women, gay, professional blood donors, drug abuse issues and in the peace movement, came together over the plight of women working on GB Road, Delhi’s red-light area. The entry into these communities was with a view to learning more about the problems of these defined groups and to see whether their viewpoints may be conveyed to the outside world. Also, if external support was needed, could it be extended on a long-term basis? When the group was started the focus was only on issues related to women in prostitution. Around the same time forcible testing for HIV infection among women in prostitution was started under an All India Institute of Medical Sciences - Indian Council of Medical Research (AIIMS-ICMR) scheme with the help of the police. AIDS and HIV infection therefore became part of the group’s concern. Public health policy for control of AIDS/HIV infection was based on targeting “high risk" groups. ABVA therefore started studying and documenting the issues related to those "target groups”. In this process other concerned citizens joined the group. The group has since taken a stand on all kinds of discrimination against “target groups".

ABVA was instrumental in stalling the Draconian AIDS (Prevention) Bill, 1989 through petitions in Parliament, public meetings, protest actions and networking in India and abroad. As a result, the Bill was placed before a Joint Parliamentary Committee. The Bill was withdrawn in October-November 1991 following a decision of the Union Cabinet.

ABVA’s petition to Petitions Committee of Rajya Sabha against the discriminatory Supreme Court order banning Professional Blood Donors from giving blood is pending since Sept.-Oct. ’98.

ABVA has brought out a series of Citizens’ Reports on ‘target groups’:

WOMEN & AIDS - Denial and Blame, 1990

AIDS & MANAVA ADHIKARON KA SANKAT, 1991, (Hindi)

THE BLOOD OF THE PROFESSIONALS, 1991

LESS THAN GAY, 1991

THIS SUGAR IS BITTER, 1992

HARD TIMES FOR POSITIVE TRAVEL, 1993

THE NEEDLE OF SUSPICION, 1996

FOR PEOPLE LIKE US, 1999

HUM JAISE LOG, 2001, (Hindi)

ENDLESS AND SICKENING THERAPIES FOR AIDS, 2002

Apart from the above reports on ‘target groups’ ABVA has brought out a report on anti-Muslim violence following the demolition of the Babri Masjid in December 1992. Titled VICTIMS’ VERSION, it was released in 1993. Also, ABVA participated in a fact-finding and report writing process which culminated in a report, titled ‘IS PLAGUE OVER?’, on the plague epidemic which had engulfed Delhi and other parts of India in 1994.

As a constituent member of the Delhi Janwadi Adhikar Manch (DJAM) – a democratic rights group formed to support the struggle of industrial workers rendered unemployed due to the 1996 Supreme Court order on shifting of ‘polluting industries’ to other parts of the country – ABVA participated in bringing out a series of reports on the issue as well as took part in popular protest rallies etc. DJAM consisted of organisations with diverse backgrounds viz. - trade unions, students unions, women’s groups, health and education groups, civil liberties and democratic rights organisations, cultural and secular groups, dalit organisations and organisations involved in a housing rights campaign and professionals in various fields. The DJAM worked as an effective democratic coalition.

In 1998-99, ABVA as a member of Campaign for Lesbian Rights (CALERI) actively participated in its campaign including leafleting in different parts of Delhi; ABVA contributed in the report 'LESBIAN EMERGENCE' brought out by CALERI.

ABVA has organised several protests against the government’s policies on testing, confidentiality and discrimination linked with AIDS.

28 February, 1990	Protest against the refusal of doctors at AIIMS, New Delhi to operate upon an African envoy with AIDS at the ICMR headquarters.
30 November, 1990	Staged a protest demonstration at the head office of the Medical Council of India (MCI), urging it to remove from its Medical Register the names of doctors who refused to treat persons with HIV infection/AIDS. About five months later, the Indian Medical Association responded by publicly stating that a refusal to treat patients with HIV infection/AIDS would be against medical ethics.
18 March, 1991	Protested outside the head office of the then New Delhi Municipal Committee (NDMC) following refusal by the NDMC Hospital at Moti Bagh, New Delhi, to treat children with Thalassaemia who had contracted HIV infection through blood transfusion.
7 August, 1991	A 500 strong sit-in was organised at AIIMS following refusal by doctors at the premier medical institute of the country to conduct a delivery on an HlV positive pregnant woman.
6 December, 1991	Protested outside the World Bank office against the use of loan/grant of US $80 million to the Government of India; ABVA feels that rehabilitation of HIV positive persons should be an important part of management. Any programme, which does not take this into consideration, should not be funded. No programme should violate the basic rights of the individual.
6 April, 1992	On the eve of World Health Day, ABVA and 37 other concerned organisations protested outside the World Health Organisation (WHO), South East Asia Regional Office, New Delhi, against plans for trials of AIDS Vaccine in developing countries.
11 August, 1992	Held the first ever protest demonstration in India condemning police atrocities on gay people, at Police Headquarters, New Delhi, after 18 persons had been arrested by the Delhi Police from the Central Park at Connaught Place on grounds of being involved in ‘homosexual acts’.
30 November, 1993	Held a demonstration at the New Delhi based office   of the United Nations protesting against the policy of the Indian Government to deport HlV+ foreigners.
6 April, 1994	Organised a demonstration at the office of the National Human Rights Commission protesting against the refusal of treatment to Deepak Biswas, suffering from AIDS in Calcutta.
30 November, 1994	Organised a demonstration at the office of the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO), New Delhi, protesting against the forcible HIV testing of women in prostitution in Calcutta.
26 September, 1995	Held a demonstration at the national Protest site Jantar Mantar, New Delhi to protest against the supply of HIV infected blood to thalassaemic children by the Indian Red Cross Society, Bombay.
30 November, 1995	Held a demonstration at the office of the Union Health Ministry, Govt. of India demanding that the report oh the BIV vaccine trial in Bombay be made public.
10 December, 1996	Protested at the American Centre, New Delhi against the illegal BIV Vaccine trial conducted at the behest of American vested interests.
7 April, 1998	Protested at the Supreme Court of India against the ban on Professional Donors.
30 December, 1998	Organised a public meeting regarding rehabilitation of Professional Blood Donors at National Gandhi Museum, Rajghat, New Delhi.

Legal Struggles: present status

On March 15, 1990 the Delhi Police acquired further notoriety when they arrested 112 women and children from Delhi’s red light area in a lightning raid under the Juvenile Justice Act, 1986. Even after the Juvenile Welfare Board pronounced that the children were not neglected, the State went in appeal. ABVA, with the help of a lawyer member, provided free legal support to the respondents.

Accordingly an application was filed on 25 February, 1991 for a summary dismissal of the appeal. The appeal was finally dismissed in March 1995, after five years of legal battle.

An intervention, by a member of ABVA and President of Fellowship for Blood Donors, in a petition filed by Common Cause in the Supreme Court of India was dismissed without assigning any reasons. Without hearing the views of the Professional Blood Donors (PBDs) in a judgment passed on January 4, 1996 in the Common Cause petition the Supreme Court put a ban on PBDs; no rehabilitation scheme of PBDs has come about. They stand criminalized.

In March 1994, the first ever public interest litigation was filed in Delhi High Court by ABVA to repeal Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code which criminalizes sodomy and makes it punishable with imprisonment of up to ten years and fine. The petition arose out of a public controversy over the refusal of authorities to make condoms available to inmates of Tihar jail. The prayers were as follows:

(a) to declare that section 377 of the Indian Penal Code is unconstitutional and void as being hit by the provisions of Articles 13, 14 and 21 and 25 of the Constitution of India.

(b) to direct the implementation of the Government’s National AIDS Programme.

(c) to declare that all action and proceedings purporting to have been done or taken by the respondents and each of them under the said unconstitutional and void law are wholly unauthorised by law, illegal and void and not binding on the jail inmates.

(d) to restrain the respondents from segregating or isolating prisoners with a certain sexual orientation or those suffering from AIDS or from commencing prosecution against those prisoners who are suspected to have participated in consensual anal intercourse.

(e)  to direct the respondents to immediately make condoms available at the dispensary within Tihar jail, where prisoners can freely obtain them without fear that they will be persecuted on account of their sexual orientation.

(f)  to direct that only disposable syringes be used in the dispensary within Tihar Jail.

(g)  to direct the jail authorities to regularly consult with the National AIDS Control Organisation, namely the Respondent No. 6.

(h) may pass any other writ, direction or order as this Hon’ble Court deems fit and proper in the circumstances of this case.

This case – which became a focal point for net working and campaigning amongst gay and lesbian groups all over the country – was dismissed in 2001.