BANWARA, India – In the fall of 2006, Gita Devi was pregnant with her sixth child when her family fell on hard times. A severe drought made it more difficult than ever to find farm work here in India’s northeastern plains. The family couldn’t afford food. It was unable to get a government ration card to buy grains and rice at steep discounts, even though it clearly was poor enough to...
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Inside Slave City-Debarshi Dasgupta, Dola Mitra, Pushpa Iyengar, Madhavi Tata, Chandrani Banerjee & Amba Batra Bakshi
What is it that makes the Indian middle class treat their domestic help with such derision and abuse? In her nine years as a nurse working with rescued domestic workers in Delhi, Mariamma K. thought she had seen the worst. That was until 2010, when she and her colleagues went to rescue a 17-year-old girl from a home in west Delhi. Sangeeta was found with bite marks all over her body....
More »RTI exposes a dam that never was
-The Times of India LOHARDAGA: The Right to Information (RTI) Act has exposed a scam worth over Rs 32 lakh. The report received under RTI has been submitted as supportive evidence in the case that was lodged recently with the Senha police station (Case No. 13/12) under various sections of IPC for cheating the government and the public. The complainant, Ganesh Sahu, a social activist has accused three concerned engineers in the...
More »Ex-sarpanch gets life for killing RTI activist's kin by Bhaskar Mukherjee
FATEHABAD: An additional district and sessions court on Monday handed down life imprisonment to a former sarpanch of Chandrawal village, who allegedly mowed down daughter-in-law of a whistleblower RTI activist. Announcing the life sentence, additional district and sessions judge (ADJ) L N Jindal also slapped a fine of Rs 6,000 each on former sarpanch Dharambir Malik and driver Satbir Singh. Two whistleblowers Jagdish Kumar and Phool Singh of Chandrawal had sought information...
More »Indirect ways to kill RTI, PMO refuses info on more than one query by Chetan Chauhan
Civil society pressure may have forced the government to keep proposed changes in the Right To Information (RTI) Act in abeyance but the information officers are quietly implementing them. The government has proposed restrictions on RTI applications that only one issue can be raised in one application and it should not be more than 250 words. But, it had to withdraw amendments following objection by RTI proponents such as National Advisory...
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