[In light of the appointment of G. C. Murmu as J & K's first lieutenant governor, it is worth reading this blogpost about Murmu by former IAS officer Sanjeev Sabhlok, written in September 2013.]
'The Centre has appointed Girish Chandra Murmu and R.K. Mathur as the new lieutenant governors of the two union territories, Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, that are slated to come into existence on October 31... Murmu, who belongs to Mayurbhanj, Odisha, was seen as a trusted aide of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Amit Shah during their stint in Gujarat. Murmu was the principal secretary in the chief minister’s office when Modi helmed the state government in Gujarat...
'The Government today ordered the winding up of Jammu and Kashmir State Human Rights Commission (SHRC), State Information Commission (SIC), State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (SCDRC), State Electricity Regulatory Commission (SERC), State Commission for Protection of Women & Child Rights (SCPWCR), State Commission for Persons with Disabilities (SCPwD) and State Accountability Commission (SAC) with effect from October 31, 2019.
'When the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) released its data for 2017 on Monday – an entire year behind schedule – a few promised new sections were missing. Data collected under the sub-heads mob lynching, murder by influential people and killing ordered by khap panchayat have not been published. According to the Indian Express, the 2017 report follows a framework largely similar to the 2016 one, except for additions under the cyber crimes and offences against the state category. “It is surprising that this data [on mob lynching, etc.] has not been published.
'In a move that openly violates the constitutional protection of free speech in India, political detainees in Kashmir, including top leaders, are being forced to sign a bond that will bar them from speaking or commenting on the “recent events” in the state as a condition of their release.
'Last week I wrote about the Union home ministry’s admission under The Right to Information Act, 2005 that they do not have any information about orders issued to shutdown telecommunication channels, TV and radio reception and advisories for the return of tourists and pilgrims undertaking the Amarnath Yatra from Jammu and Kashmir (J&K). They also admitted to a lack of information about arrests/detentions of politicians, social activists and RTI activists.
'Claimants are given a 12-digit number linked to their data, and if something goes wrong they can be refused food... Motka Manjhi had been back and forth to the ration shop four or five times, his wife said, but on each occasion he returned empty-handed. His thumbprint, needed to prove his identity, wasn’t registering on the new system.
'A week after it was floated, 132 activists, academics, students, artists and other concerned citizens of Gujarat, backed by 118 living in different parts of India and the world, have signed a "solidarity letter" supporting the people of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), who, it claims, have been silenced and held captive in their own land. The signatories include faculty members and scholars of the prestigious Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad (IIM-A).
'Ideally, the 14th convention on the RTI, on October 12, where Central and state commissioners were present, should have resolved against the amendment which reduces their collective independence. However, I am surprised that even non-bureaucrat commissioners also did not raise their voice against it. The least a convention of commissioners could have done was to ask for information on the status of commissioners themselves. But do information commissioners have the right to information on the status of commissioners?
'This is the ‘desh badal raha hai (the country is changing)’ story in all its finery. It encompasses everything and makes no attempt to hide anything: communal tension, society’s attitude towards inter-community marriages, right-wing assertion on ‘deviant’ women, Beti Bachao-Sanskari Banao, the partisan attitude of the police and media, and the helplessness of the judiciary. Anjali Jain (22) met Ibrahim (34) at a college festival and fell in love. They got married in February 2018. Ibrahim was already married when he met Anjali, but estranged from his wife whom he subsequently divorced.
