-Economic and Political Weekly The Government of India is considering a proposal to notify farming as an essential service. This is ostensibly to bring drought relief to farmers suffering from a weak monsoon - a laudable goal indeed. However, if farming is deemed an "essential service", farmers and farm workers could lose many of their political and civic rights because the government can then invoke the Essential Services Maintenance Act to...
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Delhi Police underbelly exposed -Gaurav Vivek Bhatnagar
-The Hindu Jamia Teachers’ report reveals framing of several innocents The Jamia Teachers’ Solidarity Association has in its latest report titled “Framed, Damned, Acquitted: Dossiers of a Very Special Cell” chronicled 16 cases in which most of those arrested were accused of being operatives and agents of various terrorist organisations, only to be acquitted later of all charges by the courts. In some of these cases the courts even held the police...
More »The real questions from Kudankulam -Rahul Siddharthan
-The Hindu In an atmosphere of mistrust of the government, only an independent safety regulatory mechanism can counter the scaremongering against civilian nuclear power I work at an institution funded by the Department of Atomic Energy (which, however, does no nuclear research: the DAE funds a wide variety of institutions and areas in science). About a year ago, I had an e-mail from a journalist who wondered why scientists (including colleagues at...
More »Bill for land gives true value -Mihir Shah
-The Hindu The draft law on acquisition strikes a balance between development and justice for those who will be displaced in the process India is a rapidly industrialising economy and society with intense demands for better infrastructure from its people. The last 20 years have seen a great acceleration in this process, with India becoming one of the world’s fastest growing economies. However, for those whose lands were acquired for these purposes...
More »Harda's jal satyagraha: Prohibitory orders imposed, protesters may be arrested-Siddharth Ranjan Das and Abhinav Bhatt
-NDTV Harda, Madhya Pradesh: A day after the victory of those sitting on a jal satyagraha in Madhya Pradesh's Khandwa district, the focus today shifted to Harda where a similar protest is going on for the last 13 days. More than 30 villagers are sitting here in neck-deep water demanding the water level in the Indira Sagar Dam be brought down to 260 metres from 262 metres, and rehabilitation of affected...
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