Irom Sharmila Chanu is a civil rights activist, political activist, and poet from the Indian state of Manipur. She was born on March 14, 1972 to Irom c Nanda(father) and Irom Ongbi Sakhi (mother).
Since 2 November 2000, she has been on hunger strike to demand that the Indian government repeal the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958 (AFSPA), which she blames for violence in Manipur and other parts of India’s northeast Having refused food and water for more than ten years, she has been called “the world’s longest hunger striker”.She is a 39 years old hailing from Manipur and has been continuously on fast this November she will complete her eleventh year. She hasn’t taken a single morsel of food or a single drop of water on her own during this period. On November 2, 2000, in Malom, a town five kilometers away from Imphal the capital of Manipur state, ten civilians were allegedly shot and killed by the Assam Rifles – Paramiltary forces while waiting at a bus stop. The next day’s local newspapers published graphic pictures of the dead bodies, including one of a 62-year old woman, Leisangbam Ibetomi, and 18-year old Sinam Chandramani, a 1988 National Child Bravery Award winner. After this incident Sharmila began to fast in protest of the killings, taking neither food nor water.
By 2004, Sharmila had become an “icon of public resistance”. Following her procedural release On October 2, 2006, for around four months, Irom Sharmila Chanu went to Raj Ghat, New Delhi, which she said was “to pay floral tribute to my idol, Mahatma Gandhi.” On August 23, 2011, Sharmila was involved in the wave of Anti-corruption movement on invitation by Anna Hazare via letter
Sharmila was nominated to the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize by a Guwahati-based woman’s organization, the North East Network.
She was awarded the 2007 Gwangju Prize for Human Rights, which is given for “an outstanding person or group, active in the promotion and advocacy of Peace, Democracy and Human Rights”. She shared the award with Lenin Raghuvanshi of People’s Vigilance Committee on Human Rights, a northeastern Indian human rights organization. In Addition the largest monetary prize the first Rabindranath Tagore Peace Prize was given to her in 2010 by the New Delhi IIPM . She was awarded the Sarva Gunah Sampannah ‘“ Award for Peace and Harmony” aka the 12th Signature Women of Substance award (Assam) also in 2010 . 2009 she was awarded the first Mayillama Award (Kerala). And in 2010 in the presence of the Law Minister Sri V Moilly in Bangalore she was awarded in absentia a lifetime achievement award. She was most recently awarded an Adivasi Ratna award accepted by her brother.
Here is a short documentary on her life by Kavita Joshi , My Body My Weapon
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