Sanjiv Handa

by Mike Broad

Sanjiv Handa died in December 2011. Often described as a gadfly and sometimes dismissed by officials as a pest, Handa was an activist with a consuming interest in open government. He’d attend just about every City Council meeting, sitting right up front at the press table, and he’d speak on every agenda item. We asked Attorney and former Metro Board member Mike Broad if we could print the tribute he posted on a local listserv after Sanjiv Handa died in December.

Sanjiv Handa. Photo courtesy Vik Handa.

Rest in Peace Sanjiv Handa. Often described as obsessed—and ever carried away by his micro-investigations into the workings of government bureaucracy—sometimes frenzied in his self-defined role as government watchdog, Sanjiv had the ability to inform, educate and even intimidate those he saw as guilty of obstructing justice and perpetrating the self-concealing nature of government.

Sanjiv Handa strove to keep Oakland’s City Hall and the Port Commissioners transparent. He knew that the communication we see in our local government, read, or hear, are many times incorrect, misleading, or deceptive. For this reason, Sanjiv made it his mission to uncover rumors, speculation, ambiguity, misunderstandings, mistranslations, misquotations, misrepresentations, censorship, cover ups, disinformation, hearsay, gossip, blather, bluffs, bluster, bullshit, opinions, traditions, proselytizing, assumptions, predictions, that would go against the rule of law.

His skepticism cut through the pretentious façade protecting the status quo. He pulled back the veil of secrecy and revealed the truth.

Oakland has lost one of its greatest advocates.