-The Indian Express A committee appointed by the Supreme Court to probe six cases of alleged extra-judicial killings in Manipur informed the court on Thursday that all the encounters were fake. The committee, comprising retired judge Santosh Hegde, former chief election commissioner J M Lyngdoh and former Karnataka police chief A K Singh, held that all the seven victims, including a 12-year-old boy, did not have any criminal background and had not...

-Down to Earth They turn a blind eye to laws overriding tribal rights, complains national commission GOVERNORS of states with sizeable tribal population have come in for indictment over not performing their special administrative roles. To ensure partial autonomy in tribal areas, the Constitution entrusts governors with immense powers to supervise the administration and governance in such areas. They can allow or disallow any law or development programme in tribal areas to...

-Outlook Instead of playing a leadership role, the Manmohan Singh government has surrendered all political initiative internationally to the US and the EU countries and locally to parties such as the DMK, motivated by political opportunism Is there a neo-LTTE emerging nearly four years after the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) was wiped out in May, 2009, by the Sri Lankan security forces? That is a question that needs the...

-Outlook 2,500 civilians, a majority of them marginalized tribals, were killed by the Naxals in last five years, the Home Ministry said. Since 2007, more than 2,500 civilians were killed by the CPI(Maoist) cadres and a majority of them are tribals who are branded as police informers before being brutally tortured and killed. According to the Home Ministry, tribals and economically underprivileged sections have been the biggest victims of the protracted "people's war"...

-The Hindustan Times Enacted in 1958 to deal with the Naga uprising in the then composite state of Assam, the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA) was reviewed by the Justice BP Jeevan Reddy Committee in 2005, which recommended that it be scrapped.   The Reddy report remains untabled in Parliament, despite the recent outcry, triggered by the Justice Verma Committee’s view that the Act needs to be reviewed (in the light...