Orissa: Ostracised by a nationalised bank. AIDS Patient dies

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Ostracised Indian AIDS victim dies

16, 2008: Nava Pradhan (named changed), the 42-year-old HIV-infected grade-four

staff of a nationalised bank at Kendrapara in Indian coastal state Orissa, died

at his home on Tuesday. He was pushed into a state of deep agony and distress

from where there was no return.

Nava, who was ostracised in his village, was also subjected to discriminating

treatment by the bank authorities.

He was first asked to go on a long leave and was never allowed to report on

duty. Under such circumstances, he was forced to stay back home without a job.

Nava had moved the National Human Rights Commission and Orissa Human Rights

Commission against the injustice meted out to him by the bank.

“It is a matter of deep shock and anguish that the authorities in a

nationalised bank showed such attitude towards an HIV positive person. The

behaviour of the bank employees was insensitive, inhumane and illegal,†said

social activist Abanti Behera, adding that before the two human rights bodies

came to Nava’s rescue, he died as a frustrated and heartbroken soul.

Stating that the Supreme Court of India has a ruling that no HIV-infected

employee, either in government or private sector, can be stopped from performing

duty or segregated from the workplace, Ms Behera said that the bank’s refusal

to allow Nava to work was violation of human rights and amounted to contempt of

the court. “The concerned bank officials — in contemptuous disregard to the

court’s verdict — have discriminated against an HIV/AIDS carrier. It is a

commission of penal offence by the authorities concerned as they stopped and

segregated the diseased man from bank duty,†she added.

Ms Behera, who fought for the cause of the deceased, say she would fight until

the rights bodies chastised the bank for its wrong behaviour.

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