What kept Prime Minister Manmohan Singh busy after securing minister A Raja’s resignation on the night of November 14 last year?   He was writing a reply to National Advisory Council chairperson Sonia Gandhi’s letter on the practice of manual scavenging. On November 15, he wrote to her that he was asking the Minister of Social Justice & Empowerment to “examine how to strengthen” implementation of the Employment of Manual Scavengers and...

Any new system for the socio-economic progress of Dalits and other vulnerable sections must not lose sight of Special Component Plan goals. THE Planning Commission's “Approach to the 12th Five Year Plan” deals with the Scheduled Castes (S.C.s) briefly in a portion of Chapter 11 titled “Social and Regional Equity”. It, however, significantly mentions the need to devise a new system that can overcome the difficulties experienced with regard to the...

-The Hindu   Breaking free of the traditional practice of sterilising people with mental illnesses, particularly women, a proposed law for disabled persons gives them the right to retain their fertility. Recognising the legal capacity of all persons with disabilities and making provision for support where required to exercise such legal capacity as under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the proposed new law — Rights of Persons...

-The Hindu   “No positive response seen for enforcement of reservation ” The Union government is working on a mechanism of ‘voluntary disclosure' by the corporate and private sector on enhancement of employment opportunities for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and other weaker sections. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told a conference of State Social Justice and Empowerment Ministers here on Friday that the government had taken a number of initiatives to increase ‘affirmative action' with...

The move to divide dalits into sub-groups seems headed for cold storage, amid indications that the Centre is apprehensive of the political consequences of the proposal which has polarized the volatile community along sub-castes. The social justice ministry has recalled its earlier proposal to amend the Constitution to facilitate division of the SC list as per wishes of some states. It will now seek the views of states on the entire...