'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.
'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.
'An FIR was lodged here on Thursday against nearly 50 celebrities, including Ramchandra Guha, Mani Ratnam and Aparna Sen, who had written an open letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi raising concern over the growing incidents of mob lynching, police said... He said nearly 50 signatories of the letter were named as accused in his petition in which they allegedly “tarnished the image of the country and undermined the impressive performance of the Prime Minister” besides “supporting secessionist tendencies”...
'Just weeks before the state assembly election, Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis will have to face a criminal trial for allegedly failing to furnish details of two pending criminal cases in his election affidavit in 2014...'
'Soon after a key accused in the mob violence in Bulandshahr district in December 2018 was granted bail, the wife of slain police inspector Subodh Kumar Singh claimed a threat to her life and asked the Adityanath-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in Uttar Pradesh to “kill her” so that there will be no complaint in the case anymore. The Allahabad High Court on September 25 granted bail to the district convenor of Bajrang Dal, Yogesh Raj, one of the key accused in the Bulandshahr mob violence case.
'When I read in the newspapers that the Alwar trial court had acquitted the cow vigilantes accused of lynching Pehlu Khan – which, to me, had appeared an open and shut case from the newspapers – I was curious to find out on what grounds it had done so. Having worked in the legal field where it is commonly believed that a judge who has written a perfect judgment is yet to be born, I did not expect it to be perfect. But most certainly, I expected to see from a senior judicial officer a judgment on a standard format supported with sound legal principles.
'The special investigation team (SIT) formed to probe the Swami Chinmayanand case on Wednesday (September 25) morning arrested the law student who had levelled allegations of sexual misconduct. The SIT, which was formed on the orders of Supreme Court, has allegedly arrested her in connection with the extortion case of Rs 5 crore from Swami Chinmayanand. The SIT has, as per the records accessed by NewsClick, booked the victim of sexual misconduct under sections 385, 506, 201 and also under one of the sections of the Scheduled Case/ Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
'The Congress government in Chhattisgarh has lodged an FIR against tribal rights activist Soni Sori and Bastar-based academic and researcher Bela Bhatia under Section 188 (disobedience to order duly promulgated by public servant) of the Indian Penal Code. The FIR was lodged on September 16 at Kirandul police station of Dantewada district. The activists say the purpose of the FIR is to counter their support for villagers who have been suspicious of the circumstances under which the September 13 encounter with alleged Maoists took place...'
'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.
