'The entire debate around outsiders and foreigners has been based on the long held belief that Bangladeshi infiltrators are threatening the demography and culture of Assam. But now, as per a community wise break-up of the over 19 lakh people excluded from the final National Register of Citizens (NRC), nearly a third of the people left out of the list are actually non-Bengali people, many of whom belong to indigenous tribes and ethnic groups. Shockingly thousands of Karbis, Rabhas, Sonowal Kacharis and even Ahoms have been excluded from the final NRC!
'Former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister and National Conference leader Farooq Abdullah, currently a member of the Lok Sabha, has been detained under the Public Safety Act. The PSA allows detention for up to two years without a trial. The decision to slap the PSA on the NC leader came Sunday night, on the eve of the hearing of MDMK leader Vaiko’s habeas corpus petition in the Supreme Court, where the absence of any papers justifying his incarceration since August 5 would have been a major embarrassment for the Centre.
'It seems almost sacrilegious to be less than sentimental about Chandrayaan 2. Such a huge and heroic effort! Such a massive investment of scientific skills! Such a national fervour worked up to a feverish pitch! The pride of 130 crore Indians! However, the truth is greater than any scientific breakthrough, and it must be reckoned with at all costs. First, the national hysteria about Chandrayaan 2 was deliberately worked up.
'...there is a case for autonomy [of central banks], for sure. And that autonomy is important for all institutions, and that autonomy in the central bank in India was dead, certainly, in November 2016, when demonetisation was announced. Because it was very clear at that time that this was a decision taken against the wishes of the RBI, imposed on the RBI, which then had to implement something, which it did very badly. Which it had absolutely no knowledge of, and no preparation for.
'The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is facing a barrage of criticism from prominent lawyers, human rights activists and philanthropists after it announced that it would honour India’s controversial Hindu nationalist prime minister with an award later this month. The Global Goalkeeper award recognises Narendra Modi’s flagship Clean India programme, through which the government has built millions of toilets and publicised the benefits of sanitation and hygiene. The award comes amid growing criticism of the disenfranchisement, detention and deportation of Muslims in Assam and Kashmir.
'The Jharkhand police has dropped murder charges against the 11 people accused of lynching 22-year-old Tabrez Ansari. Ansari was beaten by a mob who apparently thought he was a thief, and forced to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’ and ‘Jai Hanuman’ on June 18 this year. He died days later, in police custody. Reports say that the police have used the final post-mortem report, which says Ansari died of “cardiac arrest”, to drop the murder charge. The chargesheet again the 11 now only includes culpable homicide not amounting to murder...'
'The postgraduate student who had levelled harassment charges against Swami Chinmayanand on Monday alleged she was raped by the BJP leader. The student said that he had physically exploited her for one year. Addressing media persons here, she claimed that the Shahjahanpur police was not registering the rape case. “Swami Chinmayanand raped me and even exploited me physically for one year,” she alleged before media persons, her face covered with a black scarf...'
'The Azamgarh district magistrate on Monday ordered a probe into the arrest of a journalist allegedly after he took photographs of some children mopping the floor in their school. Journalist Santosh Jaiswal was arrested on false charges of extortion and obstructing public servants from discharging their duty, alleged a fellow journalist Sudhir Singh, who, along with another journalist, requested district magistrate N.P. Singh to apprise him of the alleged illegal arrest. “No injustice will be meted out to the journalist. We will look into the matter,” said Singh.
'Three out of every four police personnel believe that the police is justified in being violent towards criminals. Four out of five believe that there is nothing wrong with beating up criminals to extract confessions. These are some of the findings of the “Status of Policing in India Report, 2019” by Common Cause, a civil society organisation that advocates for human rights, and the Lokniti Programme of the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, a research institute supported by the Ministry of Human Resources and Development...'
'Jammu and Kashmir People’s Movement leader Shehla Rashid has been booked for sedition over her tweets in which she alleged that the Armed Forces tortured civilians and ransacked houses in the Valley after Jammu and Kashmir’s special status was revoked, police said on Friday. Rashid has called the charge “frivolous, politically motivated and a pathetic attempt to silence” her.
