-The Hindustan Times Dalits of Maha Singh Wala village in Moonak subdivision of Sangrur district have been rendered jobless due to their social boycott by upper-caste landlords. Following a dispute over daily wages, a kangaroo court of village landlords had issued the diktat a month ago. All Dalits working as farm labourers or domestic help have been sacked. The supply of milk and other essential commodities has been disrupted, forcing them to...

Apparently, people across the country, bridging class, caste and income divides, are deliberately ensuring that girls are simply not born. The child sex ratio of 914 girls per 1,000 boys is a tragic situation and a poor reflection on India’s growth and development. This is in spite of laws, schemes, relentless activism and media campaigns spanning three decades in support of the girl child. According to activists and economists, a...

-PTI Asian Games gold medallist Pinki Pramanik, who on Wednesday walked out of jail after spending 26 days in custody on charges of rape, alleged that police had tied her hands and legs and forcibly conducted the gender determination test on her. The retired middle-distance runner, who was released from the Dum Dum Central Jail after a Barasat court gave her bail on Tuesday, said she kept on crying and resisted the...

-The United Nations Punitive laws and human rights abuses are costing lives, wasting money and stifling the global AIDS response, according to a report released today by a United Nations-backed commission.   Entitled HIV and the Law: Risks, Rights and Health, the report by the Global Commission on HIV and the Law – made up of former heads of state and leading legal, human rights and HIV experts, and supported by the UN...

-The Telegraph The Supreme Court today took cognisance of a public interest petition about alleged extra-judicial killings of unarmed nationals by the Border Security Force along the Bengal stretch of the border with Bangladesh. A two-judge bench of Justices K.S. Radhakrishnan and Dipak Mishra issued notices to the Centre and the Bengal government after hearing short arguments from senior counsel Colin Gonsalves for the Banglar Manabadhikar Suraksha Mancha, an NGO that filed...