Bhubaneswar: The State Human Rights Forum, an umbrella organisation of various human rights activists and bodies, , Tuesday demanded urgent filling up of vacant posts of Odisha Human Rights Commission including that of the Chairman.
All the posts of the three-member panel have been lying vacant in OHRC after the end of the tenure of Justice Bira Kishore Mishra August 15. Even the post of registrar is lying vacant for many years now. Several members have acted as chairpersons since the term of Justice RK Patra, the Chairman, ended November 2012. Due to the absence of the members, many victims coming from across the state have been returning to their homes without getting justice.
The activists of the Forum also demanded that government should follow the legitimate process of selecting the Chairman and members through notice. The rights activists accused the government of choosing the members according to their proximity to the ruling establishment without following the rules. They also urged the government that the selection procedure should be transparent as per the Paris Principle, a set of international rules for the promotion and protection of Human Rights. The activists informed that a special team of the members will soon meet the Chief Minister, Naveen Patnaik, Governor, leader of the Opposition and leaders of all other political parties in this regard.
The state government established the OHRC as per Section 21 of the Human Rights Protection Act, 1993 for the protection and promotion of human rights of the common man. A retired judge of the Supreme Court or a Chief Justice of a High Court will be its chairman while the two other members of the panel will be HC judges or noted human rights activists or senior retired bureaucrats. The state government can also appoint Supreme Court judges hailing from other states as the chairman. However, the state government seems not interested in filling up the posts despite the fact that more than 15000 cases of human rights violations is pending at the OHRC.
