At the Khanauri border between Punjab and Haryana, a team of doctors anxiously screen the beeping sounds of the monitoring machine. The sensors attached to the frail body of Jagjit Singh Dallewal covered in thick blankets—at times—do not register any reading on the monitor. On Day 52 of h💃is fast-onto-death strike—among the longest in post-Independent India—Dallewal’s body has reached a distressingly critical state. A human body typically cannot survive without food or drink for more than seven days, although there are some records of survivors staying alive for up to 21 days.
Dallewal’s strike warrants a second attention, given his age and medical history with life-threatening cancer. His deteriorating health even prompted the Supreme Court to express concern.🌠 A striking parallel can be drawn with the case of prominent environmental activist G. D. Agarwal, who died at the age of 86 after a long hunger strike to protest against government inaction on cleaning u꧅p the Ganga River in 2018.
With no glucose and severely depleted muscle mass, Dallewal’s heart rate fluctuates frequently, blood pressu⛦re is low and ketone l🉐evels are elevated. He is unable to consume even a glass of water due to a high level of acidity that makes him vomit. As his body desperately attempts to conserve energy from the fat and muscle tissues, doctors fear the risk of multiple organ failure.
Since November 26 last year, Dallewal, the convener of the Samyukta Kisan Morcha, has been on a hunger strike to demand the implementation of farm reforms, including a Minimum Support Price (MSP) guarantee for all crops. B🐭efore starting the fast, Singh declined any medical assistance.
In a country with a severe hunger crisis —India ranks 105 out of 127 countries on the Global Hunger Index (GHI) score—the tactic of hunger strike remains a powerful tool of political protest. Activists and political prisoners from the freedom struggle have resorted to the extreme measure of an indefinite hunger strik🐓e as a last resort, signalling both the desperation to draw attention to their grievances as well as to evince a response to the failure of the government to meet their demands.
The hunger strike method arrived in India via Great Britain and Russia in the early 20th century. Political prisoners Peter and Paul Fortress are believed to have first resorted to a hunger strike in 1878 to protest against the oppressive conditions under the Tsarist regime in Russia. The ‘Russian method’ soon made its way to Britain through political prisoners and was later adopted by suffragettes in their campaign to demand voting rights for women. It eꦇventually inspired Irish and Indian nationalists, who launched several hun🅠ger strike movements inside prisons and as a form of anti-establishment protests.
In post-independent India, several Gandhian and political activists have gone on indefinite fasts or fasts unto death and even lost their lives.
In 1918, prisoners at Hazaribagh Jail resorted to a hunger strike to protest against the nature of their incarceration. Others used hunger strikes as a political weapon to protest about their grievances. In 1929, freedom fighter Jatindra Nath Das, who went on a hunger strike along with Bhagat Singh and other imprisoned freedom fighters, died in the Lahore Central Jail after 63 days of fasting. In 1933, three prisoners—Mahabir Singh of Lahore,ꦬ Mankrishna Namdas of Mymensingh and Mohit Mohan Maitra of Calcutta—died in the Andaman islands after a 45-day hunger strike.
Pramod Srivastava, a retired professor of history at Lucknow University whose book documents the hunger strikes in the Cellular Jail in the Andaman 🌊and Nicobar Islands, observed that prior to 1933, hunger strikes were not popular in India. After the protest tactic got transferred to India from Britain, it gained popularity “as a weapon of political resistance and an expansion of the anti-colonial resistance movement”, he said. In response, the British colonial powers established the practice of force-feeding hunger strikers.
Mahatma Gandhi used fasting as a non-violent weapon as well as a spiritual and moral method to unite his followers and challenge the colonial government. He is said to have gone on a fast at least 20 times, with ಌthe lo𝕴ngest in 1943, when he fasted for 21 days during the Quit India movement.
In post-independent India, several Gandhian and political activists have gone on indefinite fasts or fasts unto death and even lost their lives. The strike by Potti Sriramulu in 1952, demanding a separate state of Andhra Pradesh, ultimately ended in his death after 58 days of fasting and sparked violent protests. The Union government thereafter agreed to the creation of Andhra Pradesh, carved out of the then Madras State. Sikh le🧜ader Darshan Singh Pheruman died after fasting for 74 days in 1969 over his demand to include the ෴Punjabi-speaking region of Chandigarh in the then newly created state of Punjab.
In 2000, Manipur activist Irom Sharmila began an indefinite hunger strike for the abolition of the Armed♑ Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) after 10 civilians were allegedly gunned down by the 8th Assam Rifles. She was arrested for “attempting suicide” and force-fed through her nose for 16 years, until she ended her fast in 2016.
In 2011, Gandhian activist Anna Hazare went on fast several times in Delhi for the enactment of the Lokpal Bill. The anti-corruption movement triggered popular mass protests across the country and was believed to have helped in ♋the defeat of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government in 2014. The stark and symbolic tactic resonates with the public at large not just due to the willingness of the activists to sacrifice their body for a larger cause, but also in creating moral pressure on authorities, compelling them to respond, whether out of compassion, fear of public backlash or political considerations.
In her three decades of activism, including the Narmada Bachao Andolan, to protest against the construction of the Sardar Sarovar dam and demanding rehabilitation of the displaced and against slum demolitions, Medha Patkar adopted the tactic of hunger strike on at least six occasions including jal satyagraha (protest by standing in water).
Her 21-day fast in 1991 almost brought her to the brink of death. In 2006, she and her associates were forcefully removed by the police and force-fed on the 19th day of the fast. On four occasions when she was detained forcefully, she chose to fast while in prison. Most recently, in 2019, she and her supporters went on a nine-day hunger strike, continuing their fight for the rehabilitation of th𝐆e project-affected people. Her protests drew global attention, prompting the World Bank to withdraw funding to the construction of the dam and the Supreme Court to restrict the dam’s height to prevent further inundation.
Patkar said people on hunger strike face immense pressure to withdraw their fast. The pressure comes from both well-meaning supporters as well as police and government authorities who fear the State could𒉰 be held responsible and face public backlash or legal consequences in case of an untoward outcome, such as injury or death. “The last resort of any non-violent movement, when you can no longer tolerate 🅺the injustice and suffering, is either a long march or a hunger strike. In the past, authorities would take some action in the form of redressal through discussion or setting of committees to review its decisions, but if they fail to implement their promises, we would be forced to strike again,” Patkar said.
The varied forms of protests helped the Narmada movement with a degree of success as nearly 50,000 project-affected people have been rehabilita🌳ted in Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat. “Without non-violence, there can be no lasting change. Any change that comes from violent revolution does not last long,” says Patkar, who believes that even if hunger strike is an e🉐xtreme form of protest, it serves both as a warning and an appeal to the public and the government.
(This appeared in the print as 'Till death do us part')
