Activist Sonam Wangchuk’s wife, Gitanjali J Angmo, on Wednesday wrote to President Droupadi Murmu seeking his “unconditional release”, five days after he was arrested in Leh.

Wangchuk was arrested on September 26, two days after four persons were killed in police firing during protests seeking statehood for Ladakh.

The police firing and violence broke out on Wednesday during protests demanding statehood for Ladakh and its inclusion in the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution. Demonstrators clashed with and threw stones at the police, and set fire to the Bharatiya Janata Party office and a police vehicle.

The Union government has claimed that the violence was incited by Wangchuk’s “provocative statements”.

In her letter to the president on Friday, Angmo, the founder and chief executive officer of Himalayan Institute of Alternatives, Ladakh, stated that Wangchuk was “without cause” and that she had not been allowed to speak to her husband over the phone or in person.

“A full-scale witch hunt has been unleashed for the past one month in particular, and for the past four years covertly, to kill the spirit of my husband and all the causes he stands for and espouses,” Angmo wrote, while describing Wangchuk as a “peaceful Gandhian protester with an impeccable track record of service to the nation”.

She also claimed that she has been put under surveillance by the Central Reserve Police Force and that two members of her institute were taken into police custody in the last three days, “presumably without any authority of law”.

According to Angmo, on Tuesday, a security guard at the institute also received a communication seeking the names, details about parents, residence, photographs, contact numbers and institutional affiliations of all fellowship students, residential staff and teacher trainees there.

“Apart from the illegal detention of my husband, the manner in which the state and its agencies are hounding us and have kept us under surveillance is deplorable,” she said. “It is violative of the spirit and ethos of the Constitution of India.”

Angmo asked if speaking about climate change, melting glaciers, educational reforms or advocating for tribal and ecological protection amounted to a threat to national security.

“We request for an unconditional release of Wangchuk, a person who can never be a threat to anyone, leave alone his nation,” wrote Angmo. “He has dedicated his life to serve the brave sons of soil of Ladakh and stands in solidarity with the Indian Army in defence of our great nation.”

Copies of her letter were also sent to the Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Office, Home Minister Amit Shah, Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal and Kavinder Gupta, the lieutenant governor of Ladakh.

Demand for constitutional safeguard

On August 5, 2019, the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Union government abrogated the special status of Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370 of the Constitution and bifurcated the state into the Union Territories of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh.

The lack of a legislature in Ladakh has led to increasing insecurities among the residents of the Union Territory about their land, nature, resources and livelihoods and stoked fears that the region’s cultural identity and fragile ecosystem may be in jeopardy.

In this backdrop, civil society groups have been demanding that Ladakh be included in the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution so that its identity can be protected.

The inclusion of Ladakh in the Sixth Schedule would allow for the creation of autonomous development councils to govern land, public health and agriculture.

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