Odisha’s rising digital campaigner stirs society

By Purushottam Nayak

Mohana: The digital campaign of Catholic youth against social evils and needs in the eastern Indian state of Odisha has won both kudos and threats.

Sugyan Sagar, a member of St. Peter Parish in Mohana under Berhampur diocese, seeks the support of politicians, social and human right activists, and Church leaders to draw the government’s attention to various issues.

The first issue the 32-year-old digital activist took up was to get the Mohan Block of Gajapati district as a sub-division and Notified Area Council.

Mohana, the second largest block in Odisha, comprises 39 villages dominated by tribal and Dalit communities along with religious minority people, who have to go to Paralakhemundi, the only subdivision some 150 km away, with their issues of education, health, water and road, Sagar told Matters India.

He wants his campaign to draw the attention of Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik.

The Indian Constitution, Sagar points out, has provided constitutional safeguards and fundamental rights to minorities under various articles.

Sagar also campaigns for the establishment of a minority commission under the Odisha government.

Odisha has some 4.5 million minority people, who “have no specific office to share their grievances in the absence of the minority commission in the state,” Sagar bemoans.

He also campaigns for land for the landless with the help of Orissa Forum for Social Action, the regional social center based in Bhubaneswar, the state capital.

“We need many social and human rights activists for the transformation of our society. Many more Father Stan Swamy and Danish Siddique are needed to stand for the cause of the poor,” Sagar asserted.

Father Swamy was a Jesuit tribal rights defender in Jharkhand, Odisha’s eastern neighbor, who died in a Mumbai hospital on July 5 as a pre-tribal detainee. His death opened a floodgate of intense grief and anger across the globe. Individuals and organizations, including the United States, condemned what some alleged was judicial murder of the messiah of hapless Tribal and Dalit communities.

Siddique, a Mumbai-based Indian photo-journalist and head of the national Reuters Multimedia team, was shot dead July 15 while covering a clash between Afghan security forces and Taliban forces near a border crossing with Pakistan. He was awarded the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Feature Photography that documented the Rohingya Refugee Crisis.

Sagar says he gets inspiration for his ongoing media campaign from journalists such as Ravish Kumar of NDTV, Punya Prasun Bajpayee, Abhisar Sharma, Arfa Khanam Sherwani.

The Catholic campaigner says he often gets “threatening phone calls” for campaigning against injustice and corruption. “However such threats do not frighten me because I strongly believe in God is with me. Who can then be against me to serve people through the journalism/?” he asks.

One of Sagar’s collaborators is Bhikari Charana Behera, a social activist in Mohana. “Through social media we will succeed in reaching out to people and convince them to fight for their issues,” he told Matters India.

Behera admits Sagar’s digital campaign is “a new technology” that has helped him convince people to raise their genuine common demands.

Sagar has about 10,000 Facebook followers and another 5,000 followers for Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.

Jugal Kishore Ranjit, a Bhubaneswar based social activist, says Sagar, “an independent video journalist of our time,” raises many community level issues and uses them for his social media campaign.

Sagar’s professor at Centurion University hails Sagar Vikram Reddy hails his former student as “big asset for society” as he has “a great passion and heart for ordinary people.”

According to Reddy, Sagar began his involvement in social media began in 2008. “He wants to do something for society. He goes to the people and gets immersed in their issues. He then makes small videos and uploads in his YouTube channel,” the professor told Matters India.

Mohana parish priest Father Valentine Uthansingh, observes “a crying need” for Catholic youth to volunteers to give voice to the poor and allow the Church’s voice to be heard. “Young people can (Sagar) can use journalism with honesty to instil hope and trust in people in this pandemic-hit modern world,” the priest told Matters India.

Sagar was born on July 7, 1990, as the second of three children of Pravakar and Binoyeeni Nayak.

After primary education, he passed the tenth grade from the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe Development High School, Mohana, in 2005. He did his intermediate study at Ugratara Higher Secondary School, Kamatelapeta, Jaykapur Rayagada.

He completed Diploma in Electronics and Telecommunication Engineering from Rourkela Institute of Technology, Kalunga, Sundargarh, in 2011, and Bachelor of Technology in Electronics and Communication Engineering from Centurion University, Paralakhemundi, Gajapati in 2018.