CPI (Maoist) leaders have justified the killing of Niyamat Ansari alleging him to be a land broker, at a time when their sympathisers are condemning the Murder terming it "brutal". In an interview with the TOI on Saturday, spokesperson for the Bihar Jharkhand North Chattisgarh Special Area Committee (BJNCSAC) Gopal Jee said Ansari was not known to the Maoists as MGNREGA whistle blower but as a middleman between timber mafia...
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You Are Herewith Sentenced To Life by Pinki Virani
Let Aruna die? No, with her alive, there’s more power, media attention. Hence, the politics of mercy in medicine. Lucknow airport. Late ’90s. Khushwant Singh and I are waiting for our flights, we talk about Prime Minister A.B. Vajpayee mentioning my book Once Was Bombay in a speech on collapsing cities. He suddenly asks, “You wrote that book on the woman who neither lives nor dies, you still see her?” I...
More »Why was Niyamat Ansari Killed? : The Politics of NREGA and the Maoists by Avanish Kumar
The gruesome Murder of NREGA activist Niyamat Ansari has shocked the progressive civil society and political groups in the country. According to reports (one, two), Niyamat Ansari had exposed a case of corruption in NREGA and an FIR was lodged against a former BDO and another Panchayat Sevak of Manika block, Latehar (Jharkhand). On 2nd March 2011, Niyamat Ansari was picked from his house and beaten to death. The reports...
More »NREGS killings unique to state by Suman K Shrivastava
The Union rural development secretary, B.K. Sinha, has said that killings of activists working for the betterment of MGNREGS were unique to Jharkhand even though complaints about the implementation of the Centre’s flagship rural job scheme have come in from other states, too. Sinha, who will be visiting Latehar and Bokaro on Saturday to find out more about the Murder of NREGS activist Niyamat Ansari, told The Telegraph from Delhi, “We...
More »Justice for Niyamat Ansari
We condemn in the strongest possible terms the recent Murder of NREGA activist Niyamat Ansari in Kope Gram Panchayat (Latehar District, Jharkhand), as well as a similar attempt — the same day — on the life of his associate Bhukhan Singh. Briefly, this Murder was the culmination of a series of acts of harassment, including at least one earlier attempt on Bhukhan and Niyamat's lives. Bhukhan and Niyamat fearlessly continued to...
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