Vipin Agarwal
Vipin Agarwal was a human rights defender and Right to Information (RTI) activist from Bihar in eastern India. He filed RTI applications and exposed incidents of land-grabbing and encroachment by land mafias with political connections. On 23 September 2021 Agarwal was shot and killed in broad daylight by two men on a motorcycle. Prior to his murder, Agarwal had requested police protection as his house had been raided and his family members assaulted. This protection was not provided. Six months after his murder, Agarwal's teenage son who had been pursuing justice in his father's case died by suicide in despair at the inaction of the Bihar police.
Human rights defenders making use of the Right to Information (RTI) Act are liable to be killed, assaulted or harassed for exercising their fundamental right to demand and receive information from public authorities. Women HRDs are targeted with gender-specific threats – death, gang rape or acid attacks – both online and offline. They are particularly vulnerable in regions with a heavy presence of the military and armed groups. In the Red Corridor, a region in East India experiencing Naxalite-Maoist insurgency, HRDs, including lawyers, researchers and journalists face acts of intimidation and persecution and work under tremendous pressure from authorities, rebels, and vigilante groups. People defending the rights of marginalised communities such as the Adivasi and the Dalit can encounter death threats, destruction of their properties, fabricated charges, physical attacks, as well as caste-based discrimination by state and non-state actors alike.
