Obituary Dr V Lakshminarayana, PUCL- Karnataka (5.15.1953-22.04.2024)
By PUCL Karnataka
Eminent human rights and Dalit right leader Dr. V Lakshminarayana breathed his last around 11.30 pm in Mysore on 22nd April 2024. Dr Lakshminarayana was born in the immediate post independence era on 5th December, 1953 and went on to study medicine and practise as a dermatologist.
Dr. Lakshminarayana was closely associated with the founding of the PUCL in Karnataka and served as its General Secretary right from 1995 to 2013. He went on to serve as the president of PUCL Karnataka from 2014 till 2016. After that he assumed the role of a senior human rights activist, mentoring the younger members of the PUCL. It is due to his tireless advocacy that an analysis of caste inequality is seen as an integral dimension of human rights.
He was a Marxist, who was as committed to the world of ideas as he was to human rights activism. He regularly and enthusiastically hosted a Friday Forum in Mysore which discussed issues ranging from the sedition law to the biographies of Ambedkar.
He is survived by his partner and comrade Dr. Rati Rao, a well-known champion of women’s rights as human rights and their son Apurva. It is in fact tough to think of Dr. Laxminarayana without simultaneously thinking of Rati Madam, so intertwined were there lives by love, politics and human rights. In this moment of deep grief, our heart goes out to Rati Madam and other family members who have suffered an irreparable loss.
Yet we know that Dr. Laxminarayana, the indomitable human rights activist that he was, would have wanted us to alchemize our grief into a renewed resolve to fight for a more just world.
That would be the most fitting tribute we can pay him.
Prof. Rajendra YJ, National Secretary
Arvind Narrain, State President
Shujayathulla, State General Secretary