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ImpactMojo 101 Series · Free Forever

Human
Rights
101

What rights are, where they come from and how a development programme can use them: treaties, the UN system, the Indian Constitution, courts, commissions and civic space, for practitioners in South Asia

100 SlidesSouth Asia FocusFree ForeverRights in Practice

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Agenda

What we cover

What rights are and where they come from

Slides 3–10

The international bill of rights

Slides 11–19

Core treaties and ratification

Slides 20–28

The UN machinery

Slides 29–37

The human rights-based approach

Slides 38–45

Rights in the Indian Constitution

Slides 46–55

Courts, PIL and commissions

Slides 56–65

Economic and social rights in practice

Slides 66–73

Civic space and its legal framework

Slides 74–81

Business and human rights

Slides 82–88

Using rights in a programme

Slides 89–96

Summing up and where next

Slides 97–99

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Section One

What rights are and where they come from

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Definition

A human right is a claim with a duty attached

A human right is an entitlement that every person holds because they are human, which someone else is obliged to respect. That second half is what separates a right from a wish. When a village says it wants a road, that is a demand. When a woman says the state must not detain her without telling her why, and must let her see a lawyer, she is pointing to a duty that a named authority already owes her under the Constitution and under treaties India has joined.

Human right

A legal and moral entitlement held by every person, matched by an obligation on a duty-bearer (usually the state) to respect, protect and fulfil it, with some route to a remedy when the obligation is broken.

Rights-holder

The person or group who can make the claim: a child, a pavement dweller, a detainee, a community facing eviction.

Duty-bearer

The body that owes the duty: the state first, through its ministries, police, courts and local bodies; increasingly also companies and other private actors.

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Three obligations

Respect, protect, fulfil: the three layers of state duty

International law and Indian courts both describe the state's obligation in three layers. The framework is useful for practitioners because it turns a vague right into specific questions about who must do what. Take the right to food as the running example, since India has a statute on it (the National Food Security Act 2013) and a long Supreme Court case.

Layer	What it asks of the state	Right to food example
Respect	Do not interfere with people's existing enjoyment of the right	Do not destroy crops or block access to common land without lawful process
Protect	Stop third parties from interfering	Regulate traders who divert ration grain; act against land grabs
Fulfil	Take positive steps so people can enjoy the right	Run the public distribution system, mid-day meals and maternity support

A programme can map its own work onto these layers. Monitoring ration shops supports the protect layer. Helping families get ration cards supports the fulfil layer. Documenting evictions speaks to the respect layer.

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Where rights come from

Three sources that a practitioner meets in practice

Arguments about the origin of rights fill libraries. For field work, three sources matter because each has its own forum and its own way of being enforced. Knowing which source you are relying on tells you where to go when the right is denied.

Moral and philosophical

Ideas of dignity found in many traditions, including Indian ones. They give rights their force in public argument, but no court enforces a philosophy on its own.

International law

Treaties a state has joined (such as the ICCPR and ICESCR) and customary law. Enforced through UN reporting, reviews and, for some states, individual complaints.

Domestic law

The Constitution, statutes and case law. In India this is where rights bite hardest: Article 32 lets a person go straight to the Supreme Court to enforce a fundamental right, and Article 226 lets High Courts issue writs. Most remedies a programme will ever use sit here.

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Four principles

Universal, indivisible, interdependent, interrelated

The 1993 World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna set out the principle that still frames UN practice. Its Declaration, adopted on 25 June 1993, says in paragraph 5 of Part I:

All human rights are universal, indivisible and interdependent and interrelated.

Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action, Part I, para 5 (UN doc A/CONF.157/23, 1993)

The same paragraph adds that national and regional particularities and different historical, cultural and religious backgrounds must be borne in mind, while it remains the duty of all states to promote and protect all human rights. For South Asian practice this matters twice over. It rules out treating civil rights as a luxury to come after growth, and it also requires food and housing to be treated as entitlements.

Indivisibility has a practical reading: a family cannot use its right to vote freely if it fears losing its ration card, and a child cannot use the right to education while hungry.

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Two families of rights

Civil and political rights, economic, social and cultural rights

Civil and political

Life, and freedom from torture
Liberty and fair trial
Expression, assembly, association
Religion and conscience
Privacy, and political participation

Economic, social and cultural

Work and fair conditions of work
Social security
An adequate standard of living: food, housing, water
Health and education
Taking part in cultural life

The UDHR held both families in one text; the treaties of 1966 separated them into two Covenants with different wording on how fast states must act. India's Constitution mirrors the split in its own way: most civil rights sit in the enforceable Part III, most economic and social goals sit in the non-enforceable Part IV. Section 06 shows how Indian courts later drew the two together through Article 21.

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Individual and collective

Rights held by persons and rights held by groups

Most human rights belong to individuals. Some are framed for groups or are exercised together: the right of peoples to self-determination in Article 1 of both Covenants, minority rights in Article 27 of the ICCPR, and the collective rights of Scheduled Tribes and forest-dwelling communities in Indian law. Development work often sits where the two meet, for example when a community's claim to forest land rests on both individual and community titles.

Why the distinction matters

Consent, representation and remedy all change. An individual can withdraw consent; a group decision needs a legitimate process, and a programme has to ask who speaks for the group.

A caution

Group claims can hide unequal power inside the group. Women, younger members and lower-caste households may be overruled. A rights-based design checks both levels, as Section 05 explains.

India attached a declaration to Article 1 of both Covenants on self-determination. Section 03 reads it in full.

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Why practitioners need this

What rights language adds to a development programme

Development programmes already talk about needs, targets and coverage. Rights language adds four things that needs language lacks. Each one changes how a programme is designed and judged, which is why donors such as UN agencies made it a formal approach in 2003.

Rights language adds	What it changes in a programme
A named duty-bearer	A public office is answerable when the service fails
A legal standard	Quality and coverage are judged against law as well as a project target
A remedy	A grievance has a route: a hearing, a commission, a court
Non-discrimination	Coverage must reach the most excluded households

This deck uses India as the main case because it is where most of our learners work, and brings in Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka wherever their treaty records and institutions differ in ways that matter.

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Section Two

The international bill of rights

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1948

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights

The General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) in Paris by resolution 217 A (III) on 10 December 1948. No state voted against it and eight abstained. Human Rights Day is marked on 10 December for that reason. The UDHR has 30 articles and covers both civil and political rights and economic and social rights in one text.

10 Dec 1948

UDHR adopted, GA resolution 217 A (III)

United Nations, History of the Declaration (un.org)

states voted against; eight abstained

United Nations, History of the Declaration (un.org)

The UDHR is a resolution, so it was not written as a binding treaty. Its force today comes from the treaties built on it, from constitutions that copied its language, and from the argument that parts of it have become customary international law.

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India's contribution

Hansa Mehta and the words of Article 1

Indian delegates took part in drafting. The UN's own history of the Declaration credits Hansa Mehta of India with changing the phrase "All men are born free and equal" to "All human beings are born free and equal" in Article 1. The change is small on the page and large in effect: a text meant to bind the world would otherwise have started by naming only half of it.

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 1 (1948)

What to take from this

The idea that human rights are a Western import is weak history. South Asian delegates drafted, argued over and shaped the texts that now bind their states.

Using it in training

Starting a community session with Article 1 and the story of its wording is a simple way to show that equality between women and men was argued for from this region.

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The Covenants

1966: the two Covenants turn the Declaration into treaties

It took eighteen years to turn the Declaration into binding treaties. On 16 December 1966 the General Assembly adopted the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). India's Protection of Human Rights Act 1993 names that same date when it defines the "International Covenants" in section 2(1)(f).

Treaty	Adopted	In force	Monitoring body
ICESCR	16 Dec 1966	3 Jan 1976	Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
ICCPR	16 Dec 1966	23 Mar 1976	Human Rights Committee

Entry into force dates are those given by OHCHR for each treaty body. Together the UDHR and the two Covenants are often called the International Bill of Human Rights.

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ICCPR

What the civil and political Covenant protects

Selected articles

Art 6: right to life
Art 7: no torture or cruel treatment
Art 9: liberty and security, no arbitrary arrest
Art 14: fair trial
Art 17: privacy
Art 19: opinion and expression
Arts 21 and 22: assembly and association
Art 26: equality before the law

How it is framed

The ICCPR obliges each state to respect and ensure the rights immediately, without discrimination, and to provide an effective remedy (Article 2). Some rights can be limited for listed reasons such as public order, but only by law and only as far as necessary. Article 4 allows derogation in a public emergency, but never from the right to life or the ban on torture.

For civic space work (Section 09), Articles 19, 21 and 22 are the starting point, and the test is always the same: is a restriction provided by law, for a legitimate aim, and necessary?

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ICESCR

What the economic and social Covenant protects

Selected articles

Arts 6 and 7: work and just conditions of work
Art 8: trade unions and the right to strike
Art 9: social security
Art 11: adequate standard of living, food, housing
Art 12: highest attainable standard of health
Arts 13 and 14: education, free primary education

Progressive realisation

Article 2(1) asks each state to take steps, to the maximum of its available resources, to achieve the rights progressively. That wording is often misread as permission to wait. It obliges a state to move forward, to avoid going backwards without justification, and to meet minimum core levels and non-discrimination at once.

Progressive realisation gives monitoring a shape: a programme can ask whether budgets, coverage and quality are moving in the right direction, and whether the poorest are reached first or last.

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Minimum core

What a state must do now, whatever its resources

The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights reads the ICESCR as containing a minimum core of each right that applies immediately: basic food to be free from hunger, essential primary health care, basic shelter, and the most basic forms of education. A state that fails to meet these has to show that it used all the resources at its disposal as a matter of priority.

Obligation	Immediate or progressive	Illustration in South Asia
Non-discrimination	Immediate	A ration scheme cannot exclude a caste or religious group
Taking steps	Immediate	A plan, a budget line and a law or scheme must exist
No unjustified backward steps	Immediate	Cutting coverage needs strong justification
Full realisation	Progressive	Universal secondary education over time

Development finance is where this test becomes concrete. Budget analysis (see Public Finance & Budgeting 101) is one of the strongest rights tools a programme has.

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Limits and balance

When rights can be limited, and when they cannot

Very few rights are absolute. Freedom from torture and slavery cannot be limited at all. Most other rights can be restricted, but international law sets conditions. Indian courts apply similar ideas through Article 19's reasonable restrictions and, since Puttaswamy (2017), through a proportionality test.

LAWFUL: the restriction is set out in law

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LEGITIMATE AIM: such as public order, health, the rights of others

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NECESSARY: there is a pressing need

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PROPORTIONATE: the least restrictive option that works

Absolute

No torture, no slavery, no punishment under a law passed after the act. Not even an emergency allows these.

Qualified

Expression, assembly, movement, privacy. Restrictions must pass all four steps above, and courts check them.

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Soft law

Declarations, principles and general comments

Alongside treaties sits a body of texts that do not bind on their own but guide how treaties are read. Practitioners meet these constantly in donor documents and in court arguments.

Instrument	Year	Why it matters
Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action	1993	Universality and indivisibility
Paris Principles on national institutions	1993 (GA res 48/134)	Standards for bodies like India's NHRC
UN Common Understanding on the rights-based approach	2003	How UN agencies programme
UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights	2011	Duties of states and companies
Treaty body general comments	Ongoing	Authoritative readings of each treaty article

Indian courts have read such instruments into fundamental rights where no Indian law conflicts with them, as the Supreme Court did with CEDAW in Vishaka (1997). Soft law can become hard law through that route.

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Section Three

Core treaties and South Asia's ratification record

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The nine core treaties

The UN's nine core human rights treaties

OHCHR lists nine core treaties, each with a committee of independent experts. A tenth body, the Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture, works under the optional protocol to the torture convention. Knowing the acronyms helps when reading UN reports on any South Asian country.

Short name	Full name	Committee
CERD	Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (1965)	CERD
ICCPR	Civil and Political Rights (1966)	Human Rights Committee
ICESCR	Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (1966)	CESCR
CEDAW	Elimination of Discrimination against Women (1979)	CEDAW
CAT	Against Torture (1984)	CAT
CRC	Rights of the Child (1989)	CRC
CMW	Rights of All Migrant Workers (1990)	CMW
CRPD	Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2006)	CRPD
CED	Protection from Enforced Disappearance (2006)	CED

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Signing and ratifying

Signature, ratification and accession are different acts

A state that signs a treaty shows intent and must not defeat its object and purpose, but is not yet bound. It becomes a party by ratification (after signing) or accession (joining without having signed). The OHCHR database marks accession with an (a). India acceded to both Covenants on 10 April 1979; it never signed them first.

Signed only

India signed the Convention against Torture on 14 October 1997 and the Convention on Enforced Disappearance on 6 February 2007. As of October 2026 it has ratified neither, according to the OHCHR database.

Ratified or acceded

India is a party to CERD, ICCPR, ICESCR, CEDAW, CRC and CRPD, and to the two optional protocols to the CRC on armed conflict and on sale of children.

At India's 2022 Universal Periodic Review, the first recommendation listed asked it to ratify the instruments it has signed, particularly the torture convention (UN doc A/HRC/52/11, para 151.1).

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India's record

India and the core treaties

Treaty	India's status	Date
CERD	Ratified	3 Dec 1968
ICCPR	Acceded	10 Apr 1979
ICESCR	Acceded	10 Apr 1979
CEDAW	Ratified	9 Jul 1993
CRC	Acceded	11 Dec 1992
CRPD	Ratified	1 Oct 2007
CAT	Signed, not ratified	Signed 14 Oct 1997
CED	Signed, not ratified	Signed 6 Feb 2007
CMW	Not signed	None

Source: OHCHR treaty body database, ratification status by country (checked October 2026). India has not accepted any individual complaints procedure: the database records NO for the first optional protocol to the ICCPR, the CEDAW protocol and others. A person in India therefore cannot take an individual complaint to a UN treaty body.

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Neighbours

Ratification across South Asia

Treaty	Bangladesh	Nepal	Pakistan	Sri Lanka
ICCPR	2000 (a)	1991 (a)	2010	1980 (a)
ICESCR	1998 (a)	1991 (a)	2008	1980 (a)
CEDAW	1984 (a)	1991	1996 (a)	1981
CAT	1998 (a)	1991 (a)	2010	1994 (a)
CRC	1990	1990	1990	1991
CRPD	2007	2010	2011	2016
CMW	2011	Not party	Not party	1996 (a)
CED	2024 (a)	Not party	Not party	2016

Year of ratification or accession (a). Source: OHCHR treaty body database, ratification status by country (checked October 2026). All four neighbours have joined the torture convention, which India has not. Bangladesh acceded to the Convention on Enforced Disappearance on 30 August 2024 and to the optional protocol to the torture convention on 17 July 2025.

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Counting the record

How many of the nine core treaties each state has joined

Core UN human rights treaties joined, out of nine

OHCHR treaty body database, ratification status by country (checked October 2026)

Bangladesh and Sri Lanka are party to all nine core treaties. Nepal and Pakistan are party to seven, missing the migrant workers and enforced disappearance conventions. India is party to six.

A count is a crude measure. Ratification says nothing about practice, and some states with full records have serious violations on file. The count is still useful: it shows which UN committees can review a country at all, and which standards an advocate can cite as binding.

For India, the missing torture convention matters most for programmes on policing, custody and prisons, where the Constitution and case law carry the load instead.

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Reservations

Reservations and declarations: joining on stated terms

A state can join a treaty while excluding or modifying some provisions. A reservation excludes or changes the legal effect of a provision. An interpretative declaration states how the state reads it. The label a state uses does not settle which one it is; other states and treaty bodies look at the substance. A reservation that defeats the treaty's object and purpose is not permitted.

Why states make them

To fit the treaty to the constitution or to personal laws, to avoid a dispute clause, or to protect a policy such as reservations in public jobs.

Why they matter to programmes

A reservation marks where national law and the treaty diverge. That gap is often exactly where a programme on women's rights, detention or migration will run into trouble.

Treaty bodies regularly ask states to withdraw reservations, and the UPR repeats the request. Tracking these recommendations is a low-cost advocacy task.

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India's declarations

What India declared when it joined the Covenants

Provision	India's declaration (UN Treaty Collection)
Article 1, both Covenants	Self-determination applies only to peoples under foreign domination, not to sovereign states or a section of a people
ICCPR Article 9	Applied consistently with Article 22(3) to (7) of the Constitution; no enforceable right to compensation for unlawful arrest under Indian law
ICCPR Article 13	India reserves the right to apply its law relating to foreigners
ICESCR 4 and 8; ICCPR 12, 19(3), 21, 22	Applied in conformity with Article 19 of the Constitution
ICESCR Article 7(c)	Applied in conformity with Article 16(4) of the Constitution

Article 22(3) to (7) is the preventive detention clause. Since Nilabati Behera (1993) and later cases, Indian courts have in fact awarded compensation for custodial violations under Article 32, so the domestic position has moved past the declaration's second sentence.

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CEDAW reservations

Personal law and the CEDAW reservations in South Asia

State	Reservation or declaration on CEDAW (UN Treaty Collection)
India	Declarations on Arts 5(a) and 16(1): non-interference in the personal affairs of any community without its initiative and consent; on Art 16(2): compulsory registration of marriages is not practical; reservation to Art 29(1) (disputes)
Bangladesh	Does not consider binding Art 2 and Art 16(1)(c), as they conflict with Sharia law
Pakistan	Accession subject to the Constitution of Pakistan; reservation to Art 29(1)

Article 2 is CEDAW's core obligation to eliminate discrimination through law and policy, and Article 16 covers equality in marriage and family life. These reservations are where the treaty meets religious personal law, which governs marriage, divorce and inheritance for most people in the region. Programmes on child marriage, maintenance or inheritance work directly in this gap; Gender & Development 101 takes it further.

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Section Four

The UN machinery: Council, UPR, treaty bodies, special procedures

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Human Rights Council

The Human Rights Council, created in 2006

The General Assembly created the Human Rights Council by resolution 60/251 of 15 March 2006, replacing the Commission on Human Rights. It is the main intergovernmental UN body on human rights and meets in Geneva. Its members are states, so its decisions are political as well as legal.

Feature	Rule under GA resolution 60/251
Members	47 states, elected individually by secret ballot by a majority of the General Assembly
Seats for the Asian group	13 (African 13, Eastern European 6, Latin American and Caribbean 8, Western European and others 7)
Term	Three years; no immediate re-election after two consecutive terms
Suspension	The General Assembly can suspend a member that commits gross and systematic violations, by a two-thirds majority of those present and voting

Members are themselves reviewed under the Universal Periodic Review during their term, as paragraph 9 of the resolution requires.

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Universal Periodic Review

How the Universal Periodic Review works

Resolution 60/251 told the Council to undertake a universal periodic review of every UN member state, based on objective and reliable information. Every state is reviewed in turn by other states, cycle after cycle. The review is a conversation between governments, but it draws on reports written by the UN and by civil society.

INPUTS: national report, UN compilation, stakeholder summary

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DIALOGUE: other states question the delegation in Geneva

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RECOMMENDATIONS: listed in the Working Group report

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RESPONSE: the state supports or notes each one

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FOLLOW-UP: a mid-term report, then the next cycle

Its strength

Universality. Every state is reviewed, including those that have joined few treaties, so India is questioned on torture even without CAT.

Its limit

States review states. Recommendations range from sharp to vague, and a state can note (decline) any recommendation without explanation.

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India's fourth review

India's 2022 review in numbers

339

recommendations made to India

UN doc A/HRC/52/11, para 151

130

delegations took the floor

UN doc A/HRC/52/11, para 11

India was reviewed at the 41st session of the UPR Working Group, on 10 November 2022. Its delegation was headed by the Solicitor General, Tushar Mehta. The Human Rights Council adopted the outcome at its 52nd session in 2023.

India's response to the 339 recommendations

UN doc A/HRC/52/11/Add.1 (27 February 2023), counted from India's table of positions

Noted recommendations included ratifying the torture convention (151.1 and 151.2 were both noted). These are a ready list of issues on which the government has not yet committed.

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Using the UPR

How an Indian NGO can use the review cycle

Most development organisations never engage with Geneva, and they do not need to travel to use the UPR. The recommendations a government supports are commitments it has made in public, and they can be quoted back to it in district and state meetings.

Step	What a programme team can do	Effort
Before the review	Contribute evidence to a coalition stakeholder submission	Medium
During the review	Brief friendly embassies on two or three precise recommendations	Medium
After adoption	Extract supported recommendations relevant to your sector	Low
Between reviews	Track progress against them; publish a short shadow update	Low
In meetings	Cite the supported recommendation by number in letters to officials	Low

Illustrative: a nutrition programme in Odisha finds a supported recommendation on child malnutrition and cites its number in a letter to the district collector asking for anganwadi repairs. The letter now rests on a national commitment.

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Treaty bodies

Treaty bodies: expert committees that review states

Each core treaty has a committee of independent experts. OHCHR describes ten treaty bodies, whose members are elected by states parties for fixed renewable terms of four years. They do four main things, and practitioners can feed into each one.

What treaty bodies do

Review periodic state reports and issue concluding observations
Write general comments that explain treaty articles
Hear individual complaints, where a state has accepted this
Some run inquiries into grave or systematic violations

Where NGOs fit

Submit alternative (shadow) reports before a review
Use concluding observations as a benchmark in advocacy
Quote general comments to define a right's content
Follow up on the priority recommendations

Reviews of any one state under any one treaty come years apart. Concluding observations stay relevant between reviews and are a strong reference in policy dialogue.

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Individual complaints

Who in South Asia can take a complaint to a UN committee

Procedure	India	Bangladesh	Nepal	Pakistan	Sri Lanka
ICCPR first optional protocol	No	No	Yes (1991)	No	Yes (1997)
CEDAW optional protocol	No	Yes (2000)	Yes (2007)	No	Yes (2002)
CRPD optional protocol	No	Yes (2008)	Yes (2010)	No	No
CAT Article 22	Not party	No	No	No	Yes (2016)

Source: OHCHR treaty body database, ratification status by country (checked October 2026), acceptance of individual complaints procedures; the CEDAW row for Bangladesh is from the UN Treaty Collection, which records it as a party to the CEDAW optional protocol since 6 September 2000, with an Article 10 opt-out from the inquiry procedure only. A complaint can only be brought after domestic remedies are exhausted, and the committee's views are recommendations, but states that have accepted the procedure are expected to respond in good faith.

For India the practical consequence is clear: rights violations are remedied at home, through courts, commissions and administrative grievance routes. Section 07 covers those.

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Special procedures

Special rapporteurs and working groups

thematic mandates, as of August 2026

OHCHR, Special Procedures of the Human Rights Council

country mandates, as of August 2026

OHCHR, Special Procedures of the Human Rights Council

6 yrs

maximum tenure; mandate-holders are unpaid

OHCHR, Special Procedures of the Human Rights Council

Special procedures are independent experts appointed by the Council on themes (food, housing, human rights defenders, extreme poverty) or countries. They visit countries when invited, send communications to governments about individual cases, and report every year. Anyone can send them information through OHCHR's online submission tool.

Rapporteurs' thematic reports are a free, authoritative source of standards. A housing programme can rely on the rapporteur on adequate housing; a land programme on the guidance on development-based evictions.

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Comparing mechanisms

Which UN mechanism to use for which purpose

Mechanism	Basis	Who reviews	Output	Best use for a programme
Human Rights Council	UN Charter, GA res 60/251	States	Resolutions	Rarely direct; follow debates
UPR	GA res 60/251	States	Recommendations	Hold government to commitments
Treaty bodies	Each treaty	Independent experts	Concluding observations	Sector benchmarks, shadow reports
Special procedures	Council resolutions	Independent experts	Reports, letters	Urgent cases, standards
Individual complaints	Optional protocols	Experts	Views on a case	Only where accepted (not India)

The UN system persuades; it rarely compels. It works best when it supports a domestic campaign that already has evidence, allies and a legal route at home.

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Section Five

The human rights-based approach to development

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The Common Understanding

2003: the UN agrees what a rights-based approach means

UN agencies needed one shared meaning for the phrase "rights-based approach" across their country work. In 2003 they agreed a short statement, The Human Rights Based Approach to Development Cooperation: Towards a Common Understanding Among UN Agencies. It has three points, and every rights-based programme design can be checked against them.

GOAL: programmes should further the realisation of human rights

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STANDARDS: human rights standards and principles guide all programming, in all phases

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CAPACITY: build duty-bearers' capacity to meet obligations and rights-holders' to claim them

All programmes of development co-operation, policies and technical assistance should further the realisation of human rights as laid down in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international human rights instruments.

UN Common Understanding (2003), first point, as quoted by HREA

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Six principles

The human rights principles a programme applies

Principle	Meaning (UNFPA wording)	Question for a programme
Universality and inalienability	All people everywhere are entitled to them	Who is outside our coverage, and why?
Indivisibility	All rights have equal status, with no hierarchy	Are we trading one right off against another?
Interdependence and interrelatedness	Realising one right often depends on others	Which other rights block or enable our outcome?
Equality and non-discrimination	No discrimination on any status	Are results disaggregated by caste, gender, disability?
Participation and inclusion	Right to take part in and get information on decisions	Do communities shape design, or only receive it?
Accountability and rule of law	Duty-bearers are answerable	Is there a grievance route that works?

Principle names and short definitions from UNFPA's statement of human rights principles.

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Needs and rights

What changes when a programme moves from needs to rights

A needs-based framing

People are beneficiaries who receive help
Success means targets met and goods delivered
Priorities set by the agency and its funder
Exclusion is a coverage gap to close later
The NGO is accountable to its donor

A rights-based framing

People are rights-holders who can claim
Success also means duty-bearers perform better
Priorities include the most excluded first
Exclusion is a possible breach of equality
Accountability runs to communities and the state

Both framings deliver services, and a rights-based programme still has to deliver. The difference shows up in what the programme measures, whom it reports to, and what happens after it closes. A rights framing asks whether the public system will keep delivering once the project funding ends.

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A working method

Three analyses at the start of a rights-based design

A common working method for rights-based design uses three linked analyses. They are a method, and teams adapt them; none of them is fixed in law.

CAUSES: why is the right unrealised? immediate, underlying, structural

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ROLES: who are the rights-holders and the duty-bearers for each cause?

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CAPACITY GAPS: what does each lack: knowledge, authority, resources, will?

Analysis	Illustrative finding: girls leaving school in Class 8
Causes	No secondary school within 5 km; safety on the road; household work
Roles	Girls and parents; school management committee; block education office; state
Capacity gaps	Parents unaware of entitlements; block office lacks a transport budget

Illustrative example. The point of the method is to design activities for both sides of the relationship: for communities and for officials.

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Participation and accountability

Making participation and accountability real

Participation and accountability are the two principles programmes most often claim and least often show. Indian law gives several hooks that a programme can use without inventing new structures.

Participation hooks

Gram sabhas under state panchayat laws; school management committees under section 21 of the RTE Act 2009; ward committees in cities; consultation requirements in forest and land laws.

Accountability hooks

Right to Information Act 2005 requests, answered within 30 days (48 hours where life or liberty is at stake, section 7(1)); public hearings; grievance portals; state human rights commissions.

A test for any programme: could a rights-holder in your area find out what they are entitled to, complain if they do not get it, and get an answer? If any link is missing, building it is rights-based work.

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Illustrative case

Redesigning a water programme with a rights lens

Illustrative. A trust installs hand pumps in 40 hamlets in a drought-prone district. A rights review finds three problems: pumps in two Dalit hamlets were sited at the dominant-caste end; repairs depend on the trust; and the panchayat has a water budget it never used in these hamlets.

Before	After the rights review
Trust picks pump sites	Hamlet meetings with women and Dalit households choose sites
Trust repairs pumps	Panchayat repair budget used; the trust trains a local mechanic
Reports to donor on pumps installed	Reports also on access by caste and gender
Complaints go to field staff	Complaints also go to the panchayat, with an RTI if unanswered

The service is the same. What changed is who decides, who pays over time, and who is answerable. Social Margins 101 covers caste exclusion in services in more depth.

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Critiques

Fair criticisms of the rights-based approach

Four criticisms of the rights-based approach deserve a straight answer, because each one points to a way the approach can fail in practice.

Relabelling

A proposal can add the word "rights" while changing nothing in design or measurement. The test is whether activities, indicators and reporting lines changed.

Legalism

Rights claims can push conflicts into courts that are slow and costly, and they can favour those with lawyers. Political organising often wins more than litigation.

The state as violator

Where the duty-bearer is also the main threat, as in some conflict areas, "building state capacity" can strengthen the wrong actor. Programmes need a risk analysis first.

Resource limits

Rights language can promise more than a budget can deliver. Progressive realisation and the minimum core give a more honest frame than absolute promises.

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Section Six

Rights in the Indian Constitution

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Part III

Fundamental rights in Part III

Article	Right	Note for practitioners
14	Equality before law and equal protection	Basis for challenging arbitrary action
15, 16	No discrimination; equal opportunity in public jobs	Allow special provisions
17	Untouchability abolished	Enforced through criminal law
19	Speech, assembly, association, movement, occupation	Citizens only; reasonable restrictions
21	Life and personal liberty	Expanded by courts; see next slides
21A	Free and compulsory education, ages 6 to 14	Inserted in 2002
23, 24	No trafficking or forced labour; no child under 14 in factories, mines, hazardous work	Apply to private actors too
25 to 30	Religion; cultural and educational rights of minorities
32	Right to move the Supreme Court to enforce Part III	Itself a fundamental right

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Part IV

Directive principles in Part IV

Part IV sets out goals the state must pursue. Article 37 makes their status explicit:

The provisions contained in this Part shall not be enforceable by any court, but the principles therein laid down are nevertheless fundamental in the governance of the country and it shall be the duty of the State to apply these principles in making laws.

Constitution of India, Article 37

Directives a programme meets often

Art 39A equal justice and free legal aid; Art 41 right to work, education and public assistance within economic capacity; Art 42 just and humane conditions of work and maternity relief; Art 46 educational and economic interests of SCs, STs and weaker sections; Art 47 nutrition and public health.

Why they still matter

Many welfare laws (food security, legal aid, maternity benefit) are the state applying these principles. Courts also read them into Part III, which is the subject of the next slide.

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Harmony

How the courts joined Part III and Part IV

Early cases treated Parts III and IV as separate and sometimes in conflict. From the 1980s the Supreme Court read them together. Two passages show the shift.

The Indian Constitution is founded on the bed-rock of the balance between Parts III and IV. To give absolute primacy to one over the other is to disturb the harmony of the Constitution.

Minerva Mills Ltd v Union of India (1980), headnote

This right to live with human dignity enshrined in Article 21 derives its life breath from the Directive Principles of State Policy and particularly clauses (e) and (f) of Article 39 and Articles 41 and 42.

Bandhua Mukti Morcha v Union of India (1983, reported 1984), Bhagwati J

This is how an unenforceable directive (such as Article 47 on nutrition) becomes enforceable in part: through a fundamental right that the directive helps define.

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From Gopalan to Maneka

A.K. Gopalan (1950) to Maneka Gandhi (1978)

A.K. Gopalan v State of Madras (1950)

The Court read each fundamental right as a separate compartment. "Procedure established by law" in Article 21 meant any procedure a valid law set out, fair or not. Puttaswamy (2017) later described this as treating rights as isolated silos.

Maneka Gandhi v Union of India (1978)

A seven-judge bench, deciding a challenge to the impounding of a passport, held that Articles 14, 19 and 21 must be read together, and that the procedure under Article 21 must itself be reasonable.

The procedure contemplated by Article 21 must answer the test of reasonableness in order to be in conformity with Article 14. It must be right and just and fair and not arbitrary, fanciful or oppressive.

Maneka Gandhi v Union of India, AIR 1978 SC 597

Maneka opened the door to every later expansion of Article 21. After 1978, a law that takes away life or liberty must also be fair.

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Article 21 expands

What Article 21 has come to include

Case	Year	What the Court read into Article 21
Hussainara Khatoon v Home Secretary, Bihar	1979	Speedy trial; release of undertrials on personal bond
Francis Coralie Mullin v Administrator, UT of Delhi	1981	Life with human dignity, including adequate nutrition, clothing and shelter
Olga Tellis v Bombay Municipal Corporation	1985	Right to livelihood
Unni Krishnan v State of Andhra Pradesh	1993	Free education up to age 14 (later Article 21A)
Nilabati Behera v State of Orissa	1993	Compensation for death in police custody
Paschim Banga Khet Mazdoor Samity v State of West Bengal	1996	Emergency medical treatment in government hospitals
K.S. Puttaswamy v Union of India	2017	Privacy

Each entry was read from the judgment text on Indian Kanoon. Together they turned a short guarantee against unlawful detention into the main source of social rights in Indian law.

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Olga Tellis

Olga Tellis (1985): livelihood and the pavement dwellers of Bombay

Pavement and slum dwellers in Bombay challenged their eviction by the municipal corporation. A five-judge bench led by Chief Justice Chandrachud held that the right to life includes the right to livelihood.

An equally important facet of that right is the right to livelihood because, no person can live without the means of living, that is, the means of livelihood.

Olga Tellis v Bombay Municipal Corporation, (1985) 3 SCC 545

What the Court decided

It did not hold that every eviction is unlawful. It held that the power to remove encroachments "without notice" must be exercised reasonably, fairly and justly, so fair procedure applies before people lose their homes.

Why it matters for programmes

Livelihood and housing programmes in informal settlements still cite Olga Tellis on notice and hearing. It also shows the limits of litigation: a right recognised, an outcome that still allowed removal.

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Puttaswamy

Puttaswamy (2017): privacy as a fundamental right

A nine-judge bench held unanimously that privacy is protected by Article 21 and the freedoms in Part III, and overruled M.P. Sharma and the majority in Kharak Singh to the extent they said otherwise. Justice Chandrachud's opinion set a three-part test for any intrusion: a law, a legitimate state aim, and proportionality between the aim and the means.

For data-heavy programmes

Surveys, beneficiary databases, biometric enrolment and case files all touch privacy. Consent, purpose limits and data minimisation are now constitutional questions as well as ethical ones.

The statute that followed

The Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023 and the DPDP Rules 2025 come into force in phases under a notification of 13 November 2025. The duties of data fiduciaries, including consent and notice, apply from 13 May 2027, and so does section 17(2)(b), which exempts processing for research and statistics when its conditions are met.

Data Protection & the DPDP Act 101 and Digital Rights & AI 101 take this further.

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Education as a right

From Unni Krishnan to Article 21A and the RTE Act

1993: Unni Krishnan reads free education to age 14 into Article 21

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2002: Constitution (86th Amendment) inserts Article 21A

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2009: Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act

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1 April 2010: RTE Act comes into force

What the RTE Act requires

Free and compulsory elementary education for children aged 6 to 14. Private unaided schools must admit at least 25 per cent of Class I from weaker sections and disadvantaged groups in the neighbourhood (section 12(1)(c)). School management committees, at least three-quarters parents or guardians, give parents a formal role (section 21).

Where the right meets reality

The 25 per cent quota works only if families know about it, can complete the application and can appeal a refusal, and if states reimburse schools. Helping families apply and appeal is direct rights work, as Inclusive Education 101 explains.

Unni Krishnan held the right is limited, after age 14, by the economic capacity of the state, drawing on Article 41. Progressive realisation in Indian form.

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International law at home

How treaties enter Indian courts

India follows a dualist practice: a treaty does not change domestic law until Parliament legislates, and Article 253 gives Parliament power to make laws to implement any treaty. Courts have built a second route. Article 51(c) directs the state to respect international law and treaty obligations, and the Supreme Court uses treaties to interpret fundamental rights.

Any International Convention not inconsistent with the fundamental rights and in harmony with its spirit must be read into these provisions to enlarge the meaning and content thereof.

Vishaka v State of Rajasthan (1997)

Vishaka in practice

With no statute on sexual harassment at work, the Court drew on CEDAW to frame guidelines binding until Parliament acted. Parliament later passed the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace Act 2013.

Its limit

The route only works where Indian law is silent. A clear statute prevails over a treaty in an Indian court.

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Section Seven

Courts, public interest litigation and human rights commissions

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Public interest litigation

How public interest litigation opened the courts

Until the late 1970s, only a person who had suffered a specific legal injury could go to court. Public interest litigation (PIL) relaxed that rule so that anyone acting in good faith could bring a case for people too poor or too marginalised to bring it themselves. In S.P. Gupta v President of India (1981), Justice Bhagwati set out the principle:

Any member of the public acting bona fide and having sufficient interest can maintain an action for redressal of such public wrong or public injury.

S.P. Gupta v President of India, 1981 Supp SCC 87

Letters as petitions

Courts treated letters as writ petitions. Nilabati Behera (1993), on a death in police custody, began with a mother's letter to the Supreme Court.

Undertrials

Hussainara Khatoon (1979) concerned undertrials held in Bihar jails for years for offences that would not have drawn more than a few months' sentence. The Court ordered their release on personal bond.

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PIL tools

What courts can do in a public interest case

Tool	What it is	Example
Continuing mandamus	The court keeps the case open and issues orders over years	PUCL v Union of India, WP (C) 196 of 2001 (right to food)
Court commissioners	Officers appointed to monitor compliance and report	Used in the right to food case
Guidelines pending a law	Binding rules until Parliament legislates	Vishaka (1997) on sexual harassment at work
Compensation	Monetary relief for breach of a fundamental right	Nilabati Behera (1993), custodial death
Fact-finding	Commissions to visit and report on conditions	Bandhua Mukti Morcha (1984), stone quarries in Faridabad

In Dipika Jagatram Sahani v Union of India (2021) the Supreme Court recalled that in PUCL, WP 196 of 2001, it had issued directions to protect the right to food of the poor, including children and women, and had pressed governments to run the ICDS scheme properly.

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Using courts well

When litigation helps a programme, and when it does not

Litigation tends to help when

A clear legal entitlement is being denied
Evidence is documented and affected people consent
Many people face the same breach
Administrative routes have been tried and failed
A lawyer can follow the case for years

It tends to hurt when

Communities have not chosen it
The case exposes complainants to retaliation
An adverse ruling would set a bad precedent
Officials could fix it with a letter or an RTI
No one will follow up on compliance

PIL has two weaknesses worth weighing. Courts are poorly placed to run welfare schemes for years, and affected people can become the subject of cases in which they have little voice. Development organisations should treat a court case as one tool within a wider strategy, decided with the people affected. Advocacy Basics 101 covers how litigation fits into a campaign.

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The Protection of Human Rights Act

The Protection of Human Rights Act 1993

Parliament created the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) and the framework for State Human Rights Commissions through the Protection of Human Rights Act 1993 (deemed in force from 28 September 1993). Its definition of human rights links the Constitution to the Covenants:

"human rights" means the rights relating to life, liberty, equality and dignity of the individual guaranteed by the Constitution or embodied in the International Covenants and enforceable by Courts in India.

Protection of Human Rights Act 1993, section 2(1)(d)

Feature (as amended by Act 19 of 2019)	Rule
Chairperson	A former Chief Justice of India or Supreme Court judge (s3(2)(a))
Members	Includes a Supreme Court judge, a High Court Chief Justice and three members with human rights knowledge, at least one a woman (s3(2))
Term	Three years, or until age 70; eligible for reappointment (s6)

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NHRC powers and limits

What the NHRC can and cannot do

Powers (sections 12 and 18)

Inquire suo motu, on a petition, or on a court's direction, into violations or negligence by a public servant
Intervene in court proceedings with the court's approval
Visit jails and other institutions where people are detained
Recommend compensation, prosecution and interim relief
Review laws and treaties, and promote research and awareness

Limits

No inquiry into matters more than one year old (s36(2))
For the armed forces, it can only seek a report from the Central Government and make recommendations (s19)
Recommendations are not binding orders
Cannot take up matters pending before another commission (s36(1))

The one-year bar in section 36(2) is the rule most often missed in the field. Help people file early, and keep a dated record of the incident.

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States and districts

State commissions and human rights courts

The same Act provides for State Human Rights Commissions (SHRCs), which handle complaints about matters in the state lists, and for Human Rights Courts. Under section 30, a state government may, with the concurrence of the High Court's Chief Justice, specify a Court of Session in each district as a Human Rights Court to give speedy trial of offences arising from human rights violations.

DOCUMENT: dates, names, medical and police papers

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FILE: with the SHRC or NHRC, within one year

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FOLLOW UP: request the report the commission called for

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ESCALATE: High Court writ if relief is refused

Since 2006 the NHRC can transfer a complaint to the commission of the state where it arose (section 13(6), inserted by Act 43 of 2006). Filing with the state commission first often saves time.

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Paris Principles

The Paris Principles and international accreditation

The General Assembly endorsed the Paris Principles on national human rights institutions in resolution 48/134 of 20 December 1993. They ask for as broad a mandate as possible, independence from government, and pluralist membership. The Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions (GANHRI) reviews institutions against them: A status means fully compliant, B status partially compliant.

India's NHRC

Accredited A, but GANHRI's Sub-Committee on Accreditation deferred its re-accreditation in 2023 and 2024 and in March 2025 recommended a downgrade to B (GANHRI chart, 4 June 2026). The GANHRI Bureau rejected the NHRC's challenge in December 2025, and the review was postponed to November 2026 (Human Rights Watch joint submission, 1 October 2026).

Why this matters

Accreditation decides whether an institution can speak in its own right at the Human Rights Council. The concerns raised (independence, pluralism in appointments) are the same ones an NGO weighs when deciding where to file a complaint.

Check the latest GANHRI decision before citing India's status: the November 2026 decision was pending as of October 2026.

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Neighbours' commissions

National human rights institutions in the neighbourhood

Country	Institution and legal basis	GANHRI status
Nepal	NHRC Nepal: statutory body from 2000; constitutional body under Art 131 of the Interim Constitution 2007 and Art 248 of the Constitution 2015	A (October 2023, March 2025)
Pakistan	National Commission for Human Rights, NCHR Act 2012	A (first session 2024)
Sri Lanka	Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka, Act No. 21 of 1996, established 1997	B from October 2022; A again from first session 2024
Bangladesh	NHRC under the NHRC Act 2009; members resigned November 2024; NHRC Ordinance 2025 gazetted 9 November 2025	B (2011, 2015)

Sources: GANHRI accreditation chart as of 4 June 2026; NHRC Nepal and HRCSL websites; NCHR website; Bangladesh Platform for SDGs timeline (2026) and Prothom Alo (10 December 2025), which reported the commission still not functioning. Statuses can change at any GANHRI session.

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Neighbours' courts

Constitutional routes to court in the neighbourhood

Country	Provision	What it allows
Bangladesh	Constitution Art 102	High Court Division, on the application of any person aggrieved, can give directions to enforce fundamental rights
Pakistan	Constitution Arts 199 and 184(3)	High Court writs; Supreme Court orders on a question of public importance about fundamental rights
Sri Lanka	Constitution Art 126	Supreme Court's exclusive jurisdiction over executive or administrative infringement; petition within one month
Nepal	Constitution Art 46, with Arts 133 and 144	Right to constitutional remedy through the Supreme Court and High Courts

Texts from the Constitute Project editions of each constitution. Sri Lanka's one-month limit is short: a programme there needs a lawyer it can reach quickly, since the time runs from the infringement.

Pakistan's Article 184(3), like India's PIL, lets the Supreme Court act directly on questions of public importance about fundamental rights. In every country here, check limitation periods before advising anyone.

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Section Eight

Economic and social rights in practice

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Right to food

The right to food: from a court case to a statute

The right to food in India grew from PUCL v Union of India (WP (C) 196 of 2001), in which the Supreme Court turned schemes such as mid-day meals and ICDS into entitlements through interim orders. Parliament then passed the National Food Security Act 2013.

Entitlement under the NFSA 2013	Section
Coverage up to 75% of the rural and 50% of the urban population	s3(2)
5 kg of foodgrains per person per month for priority households	s3(1)
35 kg per household per month for Antyodaya Anna Yojana households	s3(1), proviso
Free meals and maternity benefit of at least Rs 6,000 for pregnant and lactating women	s4
One free mid-day meal on school days for children aged 6 to 14	s5(1)(b)

An entitlement in a statute can be claimed. A household wrongly left off the ration list has a grievance route under the Act, which a programme can help it use.

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Nutrition outcomes

Child stunting in four South Asian countries

Children under five who are stunted (%), latest DHS-type survey

India: NFHS-6 (2023-24) India fact sheet, IIPS, May 2026. Others: the DHS Program API, indicator CN_NUTS_C_HA2: Pakistan PDHS 2017-18, Nepal NDHS 2022, Bangladesh BDHS 2022

Stunting measures long-term undernutrition. India's 29.3 per cent comes from the NFHS-6 fact sheet (2023-24), down from 35.5 per cent in NFHS-5 (2019-21). The surveys are from different years, so the comparison is indicative.

A rights reading asks more than whether the number is high. It asks whether the state is meeting the minimum core (CESCR General Comment 3 names essential foodstuffs), whether the trend is downward, and whether the poorest groups are improving as fast as the average.

Nutrition 101 covers the measurement and the interventions; this deck covers the duty.

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Right to health

Health as a right: Paschim Banga (1996)

Hakim Seikh, an agricultural labourer, fell from a train in West Bengal in July 1992 and suffered head injuries. Several government hospitals in Calcutta turned him away for lack of beds or facilities. The Supreme Court held that this breached Article 21.

In a welfare state the primary duty of the Government is to secure the welfare of the people. Providing adequate medical facilities for the people is an essential part of the obligations undertaken by the Government in a welfare state.

Paschim Banga Khet Mazdoor Samity v State of West Bengal, (1996) 4 SCC 37

What followed

The Court awarded compensation and directed steps to improve emergency care, holding that lack of resources cannot excuse failure to provide emergency treatment.

Nepal goes further on paper

Nepal's Constitution of 2015 makes basic health care a fundamental right of every citizen in Article 35, and food in Article 36. Bangladesh's Constitution lists basic necessities in Article 15 but, under Article 8, the principles in that Part are not judicially enforceable.

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Right to work

Work and social security in 2026

Article 41 asks the state, within its economic capacity, to secure the right to work and to public assistance in old age, sickness and disablement. Two legal changes in 2025 and 2026 reshape how practitioners work on these rights in India (as of October 2026).

Rural employment

The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act was repealed from 1 July 2026 and replaced by the Viksit Bharat G RAM G Act 2025, which provides for 125 days of work. Programmes that helped workers demand work and wages under the old Act need to read the new Act and its rules before advising anyone.

Labour Codes

The four Labour Codes came into force on 21 November 2025, replacing most central labour laws. Social security, wages and occupational safety for informal and platform workers now sit under the Codes.

Work, Labour & Livelihoods 101 covers both changes. In rights terms, the questions are the same as before: is the entitlement clear, can workers claim it, and is there a remedy for delay?

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Housing and eviction

Housing, eviction and fair procedure

India's Constitution does not name a right to housing, but Olga Tellis (1985) tied livelihood and shelter to Article 21 and required fair procedure before removal. Nepal's 2015 Constitution states a right to appropriate housing and bars eviction except in accordance with law. The UN special rapporteur on adequate housing has set out guidance on development-based evictions.

Before an eviction, ask	Why
Was notice given, in a language people read?	Fair procedure under Article 21
Was there a hearing or survey of who lives there?	To establish eligibility for rehabilitation
Is there a resettlement plan near work and schools?	Livelihood is part of the right to life
Is the timing safe (exams, monsoon, harvest)?	Proportionality of the action
Are records kept of who was moved and where?	For later claims and remedies

Illustrative checklist for programme staff; it is not legal advice. Contact a lawyer as soon as an eviction notice appears.

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Measuring rights

Measuring economic and social rights

OHCHR's guide Human Rights Indicators: A Guide to Measurement and Implementation (2012) groups indicators into three kinds. Programme teams can borrow the structure for their own monitoring.

Type	What it measures	Example for the right to education
Structural	Laws, policies and institutions in place	Article 21A; RTE Act 2009; state rules notified
Process	Effort: budgets, programmes, coverage	Share of RTE 25% seats filled; teacher vacancies; SMC meetings held
Outcome	Results for rights-holders	Completion of Class 8 by girls, Dalit and Adivasi children, children with disabilities

Disaggregation is what turns an ordinary indicator into a rights indicator. An average that rises while one caste or district falls behind can hide a breach of non-discrimination.

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Budgets as evidence

Reading a budget as a rights document

Article 2(1) of the ICESCR speaks of the maximum of available resources, so budgets are evidence. Three questions turn a budget into a rights analysis, and each can be asked of a state or district budget using published documents and RTI.

Allocation

Is enough allocated for the entitlement the law promises? Compare the allocation with the number of eligible people and the unit cost.

Release and spending

Was the money released on time, and spent? Late releases turn an entitlement into a delay.

Equity

Do districts with more need receive more per eligible person? Are funds for SC and ST sub-plans spent on them?

Backward steps

Did a scheme's allocation fall in real terms? A cut needs justification under the progressive realisation duty.

Public Finance & Budgeting 101 shows how to read Indian budget documents.

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Section Nine

Civic space and its legal framework

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The standards

Expression, assembly and association: the legal standards

Freedom	ICCPR	Constitution of India	Permitted grounds for restriction (India)
Speech and expression	Art 19	Art 19(1)(a)	Art 19(2): sovereignty and integrity, security, public order, decency, defamation, incitement, and others
Peaceful assembly	Art 21	Art 19(1)(b)	Art 19(3): sovereignty and integrity, public order
Association	Art 22	Art 19(1)(c)	Art 19(4): sovereignty and integrity, public order, morality

This section states the law as it stands in India as of October 2026. It does not judge particular cases. Development organisations need to know these laws because they govern how an NGO is funded, how its staff and partners can speak, and what risks community members take when they organise.

The UN Declaration on Human Rights Defenders (GA resolution 53/144, 9 December 1998) affirms in Article 1 that everyone has the right, individually and in association with others, to promote and strive for the protection of human rights.

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Sedition

Sedition: from section 124A to the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita

IPC s124A: sedition offence since the colonial era

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11 May 2022: S.G. Vombatkere v Union of India order

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2023: Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (Act 45 of 2023) enacted

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1 July 2024: BNS in force; IPC repealed by s358

In S.G. Vombatkere v Union of India (WP (C) 682 of 2021), the Supreme Court's order of 11 May 2022 expected governments to refrain from registering FIRs under section 124A while the Union reconsidered it, and directed that pending trials and appeals on that charge be kept in abeyance. The BNS contains no offence named sedition. Its section 152, "Act endangering sovereignty, unity and integrity of India", punishes exciting secession, armed rebellion or subversive activities, or encouraging feelings of separatist activities, with up to life imprisonment.

Section 152 carries an explanation that comments expressing disapproval of government measures, without exciting the listed activities, are not an offence. How courts read the section is still developing; check current case law before advising.

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UAPA

The Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act 1967

The UAPA is India's main anti-terror law. Three features matter most for anyone working on rights, because they change what happens after an arrest.

Feature	Provision
Designation of individuals as terrorists	Section 35, as amended in 2019: individuals can be added to the Fourth Schedule by notification
Bail	Section 43D(5): no bail if the court finds reasonable grounds to believe the accusation is prima facie true
Time to complete investigation	Section 43D(2): may be extended up to 180 days

The presence of statutory restrictions like Section 43-D(5) of UAPA per se does not oust the ability of Constitutional Courts to grant bail on grounds of violation of Part III of the Constitution.

Union of India v K.A. Najeeb (2021), para 18

In Najeeb the Court held that the bail bar softens where there is no likelihood of the trial ending in reasonable time and the accused has served a large part of the possible sentence.

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FCRA

Foreign funding: the FCRA 2010 as amended in 2020

The Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act 2010 governs any Indian organisation receiving foreign funds. The 2020 amendment (Act 33 of 2020) changed four rules that shape how development partnerships are built.

Section	Rule after 2020	Effect on programmes
7	No transfer of foreign contribution to any other person	No sub-granting of foreign funds to partner NGOs
8(1)(b)	Administrative expenses capped at 20% of foreign contribution in a year	Core costs need other sources
12A	Aadhaar (or passport, for foreigners) of office bearers may be required	Identity documents for key staff
17	Receipt only in an FCRA account at the specified SBI branch in New Delhi	Account set-up before any receipt

In Noel Harper v Union of India (8 April 2022) the Supreme Court held sections 7, 12(1A), 12A and 17 as amended intra vires, reading section 12A to accept an Indian passport for Indian office bearers.

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Information rights

The right to information after the DPDP Act

The Right to Information Act 2005 is the most used accountability law in India. Section 7(1) requires a reply within 30 days, or 48 hours where the information concerns a person's life or liberty.

The 2025 change

Section 44(3) of the Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023 substitutes section 8(1)(j) of the RTI Act with an exemption for "information which relates to personal information", removing the earlier public-interest override. The amendment took effect on 13 November 2025, the date of the Gazette notification (G.S.R. 843(E)) that brought it into force.

Status

On 26 May 2026 the Supreme Court issued notice to the Union on petitions challenging the amendment (Moneylife, 26 May 2026). Social audits that depend on names of beneficiaries or officials may find requests refused while the challenge is pending.

Frame RTI requests around aggregate and scheme-level records where possible: budgets, sanction orders, stock registers, inspection reports.

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Working lawfully

Compliance as protection for an organisation

For an NGO, careful compliance is part of protecting the people it works with. A lapsed registration or an accounting error can end a programme and expose communities who relied on it. A short internal checklist reviewed every quarter covers most risk.

Area	Check
FCRA	Registration valid; funds only via the SBI New Delhi account; no onward transfer; admin costs within 20%; returns filed
Data	Preparation for DPDP Act consent and notice duties (in force from 13 May 2027); purpose limits; research exemption conditions met where relied on
Speech	Public statements reviewed for accuracy and sourcing; no unverified allegations
Staff safety	Plan for arrests or summons; lawyer contact; family contacts
Partners	Written agreements; no cash routing; documented decisions

Illustrative checklist, not legal advice. Use a chartered accountant and a lawyer familiar with FCRA and the DPDP Act.

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Defenders and risk

Protecting people who raise rights issues

Community members who complain, testify or organise take risks that programme staff can underestimate. A rights-based programme plans for retaliation before it asks anyone to speak up, and it keeps the decision with the person at risk.

Before

Map who might retaliate (local officials, employers, dominant groups). Explain risks plainly. Agree what will be recorded and who sees it.

During

Collect only the data you need; store it securely; avoid naming people in public reports without explicit consent.

If retaliation occurs

Record dates and details at once; contact a lawyer; consider a complaint to the SHRC within the one-year limit; inform trusted networks.

UN routes

The UN special rapporteur on human rights defenders receives communications through OHCHR's online tool. Use it with the person's consent.

Safeguarding & PSEA 101 and Research Ethics 101 cover consent and protection in depth.

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Section Ten

Business and human rights

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The UN Guiding Principles

The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (2011)

The Human Rights Council endorsed the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) in resolution 17/4 of 16 June 2011. They implement the "Protect, Respect and Remedy" framework and rest on three pillars.

Pillar I: the state duty to protect

States must protect against human rights abuse by business through laws, policies, regulation and adjudication.

Pillar II: corporate responsibility to respect

Business enterprises should respect human rights: avoid infringing them and address adverse impacts they are involved with (Principle 11).

Pillar III: access to remedy

Victims need effective judicial and non-judicial remedies, run by the state and by companies themselves.

The UNGPs are not a treaty. Their force comes from adoption into national law, company policies, investor rules and supply-chain contracts.

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Due diligence

Human rights due diligence

In order to identify, prevent, mitigate and account for how they address their adverse human rights impacts, business enterprises should carry out human rights due diligence.

UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, Principle 17

ASSESS: actual and potential impacts

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INTEGRATE: act on the findings

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TRACK: check whether responses work

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COMMUNICATE: say how impacts are addressed

For NGOs partnering with companies

Ask to see the company's due diligence on the site or supply chain you will work in. A CSR project beside a factory with unresolved labour complaints is exposed to the same risk.

For communities

Due diligence gives communities a question to ask: has the company assessed its impact on us, and what did it find?

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Grievance mechanisms

What makes a grievance mechanism work (Principle 31)

Criterion	What it means	Test in the field
Legitimate	Trusted by the people it is for	Would workers use it without fear?
Accessible	Known to all, with help for those facing barriers	Is it in local languages?
Predictable	Clear procedure with timeframes	Are deadlines published?
Equitable	Fair access to information and advice	Can complainants get advice?
Transparent	Parties kept informed of progress	Are outcomes reported?
Rights-compatible	Outcomes accord with human rights	Does it block court cases?
Source of continuous learning	Lessons used to prevent harm	Do policies change?
Based on engagement and dialogue	Designed with users (company-level mechanisms)	Were workers consulted?

The same eight tests work for an NGO's own complaints system, and for a government grievance portal.

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India's framework

Business and human rights in Indian law and policy

Instrument	What it does	Status (October 2026)
National Action Plan on Business and Human Rights	Zero draft by the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, February 2019	Not adopted; globalnaps.org lists it as under development
National Guidelines on Responsible Business Conduct (2018)	Nine principles for business	Basis for SEBI reporting
SEBI Business Responsibility and Sustainability Report	ESG disclosure against the nine principles (circular of 10 May 2021)	Mandatory for the top 1,000 listed companies from FY 2022-23
Companies Act 2013, section 135	CSR spending duty for qualifying companies	In force
Four Labour Codes	Wages, social security, safety, industrial relations	In force from 21 November 2025

BRSR disclosures are public. An NGO can read a company's human rights disclosures before partnering and compare them with what workers and communities report. CSR & ESG 101 explains BRSR.

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Supply chains

Rana Plaza and supply-chain responsibility

On 24 April 2013 the Rana Plaza building in Savar, near Dhaka, collapsed, killing more than 1,100 garment workers (US Congressional Research Service, report R43085, 2014). The factories made clothes for international brands. The disaster changed how buyers, governments and unions think about responsibility along supply chains.

What changed

The question of whether a brand answers for conditions in the factories that supply it moved from campaign slogans into buyer contracts, investor questions and law-making on due diligence. The UNGPs, adopted two years earlier, gave that debate its vocabulary.

What it teaches programmes

Audits failed to stop the collapse. Worker voice (the ability to refuse unsafe work and to report without retaliation) is the mechanism that rights-based programmes can strengthen.

Many Indian and Bangladeshi suppliers now face due diligence questions from buyers. Workers' organisations can use those questions as a route for grievances.

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NGO roles

Where development organisations fit in business and human rights

Roles that work

Help communities document impacts and use company grievance mechanisms
Translate company commitments into local languages and terms
Provide independent monitoring where communities ask for it
Partner on CSR only after reviewing due diligence and disclosures

Roles to avoid

Running a company's grievance system with no independence
Using CSR funds to deliver services the state must provide, with no exit plan
Signing confidentiality terms that prevent reporting harm
Speaking for communities without their mandate

A clear written agreement, an exit plan and an independent complaints route protect both the NGO and the community when a company relationship goes wrong.

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Section Eleven

Using rights in a programme

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Design checklist

A rights check for any programme design

Run this check at design stage and again at mid-term. Each question links to a part of this deck. A "no" is a design task, and the answers belong in the proposal.

Question	Look for	Deck section
Which rights does the programme serve, and in which law?	Article, statute, treaty article	02, 06, 08
Who are the duty-bearers, by name and office?	Department, officer, local body	01, 05
Who is most likely to be excluded?	Disaggregated baseline	05, 08
How do rights-holders take part in decisions?	Meetings, committees, consent	05
What is the grievance route, and does it work?	Tested route with timelines	07, 10
What does the state already owe here?	Scheme entitlements, UPR and treaty commitments	04, 08
What could go wrong for participants?	Risk and safeguarding plan	09
Who sustains the gains after the project?	Public budget line, institution	05, 08

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Worked example

Worked example: migrant workers from a Bihar district

Illustrative. An NGO in a source district of Bihar works with families of seasonal migrant workers who go to brick kilns and construction sites in other states. It wants to move from relief to rights.

Problem found	Right and source	Duty-bearer	Programme action
Families lose rations when the worker migrates	Food: NFSA 2013	State food department	Help families use ration portability; RTI on denied cases
Children drop out during migration months	Education: Art 21A, RTE Act	School and block office	Seasonal hostels via panchayat; track enrolment
Unpaid wages at destination	Work: Labour Codes (2025)	Labour department at destination	Documented wage claims; partner NGO at destination
Advance-and-debt bondage at kilns	Art 23; Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act 1976	District magistrate	Report to DM; SHRC complaint if no action

Every row has a law, a named office and an action. That is the shape of a rights-based workplan.

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Choosing a route

Decision table: which route for which problem

Situation	First route	If that fails	Avoid
Scheme benefit denied	Written application; grievance portal	RTI on the file; district official	Going to court first
Information withheld	RTI request (30 days)	First appeal, then Information Commission	Informal requests only
Police abuse or custodial harm	Medical record; complaint to senior police	SHRC or NHRC within one year; High Court writ	Delay beyond one year
Systemic denial affecting many	Collective representation with evidence	PIL with the affected people's consent	Litigation without community choice
Company harm to a community	Company grievance mechanism	Regulator; court; BRSR-based investor engagement	Signing confidentiality terms
Pattern that government ignores	Media and allies; treaty body shadow report	UN special procedure communication	Relying on Geneva alone

Illustrative guidance for programme staff, not legal advice. Routes differ by state, and a lawyer should advise on any case that may go to court.

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Documenting violations

Documenting a rights violation so it can be used

Evidence gathered carelessly can be useless in a commission or court, and can put people at risk. A few habits make documentation usable and safe.

What to record

Who, what, when, where, with dates and times; names and ranks of officials; documents such as FIRs, medical records, notices; photographs with dates; witnesses who agree to be named.

How to record it

Informed consent in the person's language; only the data needed; secure storage with limited access; a clear chain of who holds originals.

What to avoid

Leading questions; promising outcomes; sharing names on messaging groups; posting identifiable images of survivors, especially children.

Law to respect

The DPDP Act 2023 and Rules 2025 govern personal data you collect, with consent and notice duties applying from 13 May 2027. Laws on child victims and sexual offences restrict disclosing identities.

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Writing to a duty-bearer

A rights-based letter in five parts

Most rights work starts with a letter, and a well-built letter is often enough. It also creates the record that any later complaint or petition will need.

FACTS: who, what, when, with documents

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ENTITLEMENT: the law, section or scheme rule

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DUTY: the office responsible and its obligation

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REQUEST: a specific action and a date

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RECORD: copy to senior office; keep proof of delivery

Illustrative: "Under section 3(1) of the National Food Security Act 2013, the 14 households listed are entitled to 5 kg of grain per person per month. Their cards were cancelled on 3 March without notice. We request restoration within 15 days and a written reason for the cancellation."

A letter that names the law and asks for a dated action is harder to ignore than one that asks for help. If there is no reply, an RTI request on the file and a copy to the district collector are the next steps.

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Rights in the results framework

Putting rights into indicators and the logframe

Level	Conventional indicator	Rights-based version
Outcome	Children enrolled	Children completing Class 8, by sex, caste, disability
Outcome	Households with ration cards	Eligible households receiving full entitlement for six consecutive months
Output	Trainings held	Grievances filed and resolved within the legal time limit
Output	Committees formed	Committees meeting with women and SC/ST members speaking
Process	Funds spent	Public allocation for the service released on time

The rights-based column measures the duty-bearer's performance and equality of access, which is where a rights approach differs from a delivery approach. Logframe 101 and MEL Basics 101 show how to build these into a results framework.

Disaggregate every people-level indicator by at least sex, caste or tribe, and disability. Without that, non-discrimination cannot be checked.

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Do no harm

Protecting communities and staff in rights work

Risks to plan for

Retaliation against complainants by officials or local elites
Loss of benefits as punishment for speaking up
Exposure of identities through data leaks
Legal risk to staff from public statements
Raised expectations that the programme cannot meet

Mitigations

Consent at each step, including the right to withdraw
Collective complaints where they are safer for individuals
Data minimisation and secure storage
Fact-checked, sourced public statements
Honest explanation of what each route can and cannot do

The person whose rights were violated decides whether to complain. A programme's job is to make the options and risks clear, and to stand with that decision.

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Section Twelve

Summing up and where next

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Summary

Eight points to carry into practice

On the law

A right is a claim with a named duty-bearer and a remedy
India is party to six of nine core UN treaties; not CAT, CED or CMW
Article 21, read with Part IV, carries most social rights in India
Treaties enter Indian courts where Indian law is silent (Vishaka, 1997)

On practice

Start with domestic routes: letters, RTI, commissions, courts
File with an SHRC or the NHRC within one year
Measure duty-bearer performance and equality as well as delivery
Plan for retaliation and data protection before asking anyone to speak

Check time-sensitive facts before you rely on them: GANHRI status, the DPDP and RTI litigation, the new rural employment law and the Labour Codes were all changing as of October 2026.

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Where next

Where next: related 101 decks

Law and institutions

Indian Constitution 101 for Parts III and IV in depth. Child Rights 101 for the CRC and Indian child law. Governance & Accountability 101 for RTI, audits and grievance systems. Digital Rights & AI 101 for privacy and data after Puttaswamy.

Practice and people

Advocacy Basics 101 for campaigns that use these routes. Social Margins 101 for caste, tribe and exclusion. Gender & Development 101 for CEDAW and personal law. Data Protection & the DPDP Act 101 and Safeguarding & PSEA 101 for protecting the people you work with.

Suggested order: Indian Constitution, then Governance & Accountability, then Advocacy Basics. Read Child Rights before any programme that works with children.

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Human Rights 101

Name the right, name the duty-bearer, find the remedy

ImpactMojo 101 Series · Free foundational learning for development practitioners in South Asia

Indian Constitution 101 All 101 courses

100 slides·12 sections·CC BY-NC-ND