Boston Review Amplifies Celebrated Indian Poet and Prisoner Varavara Rao's Plight

Boston Review shares a heartbreaking plea written by Varsha Gandikota-Nellutla, the niece of celebrated Indian poet and activist, Varavara Rao, who has been imprisoned on-and-off since 2018 and is now in urgent need of medical care. "For many people, campaigns for political prisoners conjure images of battles in courts, fought between heated lawyers waxing eloquent about ideology. In fact, they are very often about simply knowing someone’s whereabouts," writes Gandikota-Nellutla. From there: 

Where is he? Could we see him? About the days of COVID-19, Heidi Pitlor writes, “Giving shape to time is especially important now, when the future is so shapeless.” What of time that feels like it’s running out?

When you have a loved one awaiting trial, the things that divide up your days become court dates—are we fully prepared, maybe there’ll be a judgment? The newly minted Unlawful Activities Prevention Act, or UAPA, gives the Indian government the power to designate someone an enemy of the state without a trial. This means that in India’s new unconstitutional regime, the effort to get a trial takes on its own unending rhythm. Before you realize, the nervous eagerness that precedes each hearing withers into slow defeat.

Again, the court date arrived on June 2. The judge was absent. A delay, three more days. The court date arrived yet again, the mysterious medical report was still missing. A delay, five days. The judge was absent. Two days. This time, the medical report appeared, but was yet to be read. A week. The prosecution needed time to prepare. Another week.

Hope. A trim, solid word. What does it feel like today? Purchasing a book for Bapu—he had asked to read Toni Morrison’s Beloved (1987). A text with a poem about him. His friends write one each day. A campaign, a new one, this time by Amnesty International.

June 26, and I’m staring at my phone again. The arguments have been heard. “ORDER RESERVED.” I began reading up on reserved orders: When might judges choose not to immediately deliver a decision? Is this a good thing? Is there additional evidence to review? Three hours in, DENIED.

In a 1990 poem, “The Other Day,” detailing the night before an arrest, Bapu asks:

In what discourse

Can we converse

With the heartless?

On July 11, I watched as my aunt sat down in front of a camera for a press conference after receiving a call from Bapu that made clear his critical condition. Holding back tears, she urged, “I’m not asking for bail, for release, for anything—please get him medical care and save his life.”

In moments, I think I intend this to be a letter to him—perhaps some affection will get past the prison bars. Other times, I imagine it as a call to the public—maybe my anguish will agitate them. I am not certain anymore. Teju Cole once remarked: “Writing as writing. Writing as rioting. Writing as righting. On the best days, all three.” In this period of cruel waiting, perhaps mine is writing as remembering, and perhaps it will be a reckoning.