-India Today   Their heart is with Anna Hazare but their mind refuses to accept the anti-corruption crusader's mode of protest. Muslim and Dalit organisations supported Anna's fight against corruption, but feared that the Sangh Parivar could hijack the campaign. They also warned him about it. The All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) has decided to stay away from Anna's a campaign "because of its political overtones". "Our organisation believes this issue doesn't...

Ruth Manorama started her work with the urban poor in her youth; there has been no turning back ever since. She is the powerful voice of Dalit women today. Is it easy being a Dalit in India? And a woman at that? Have things changed for the better for the Dalits who constitute roughly 16.23 per cent of our population, since the Constitution of India “cast a special responsibility on the...

The draft Prevention of Communal and Targeted Violence Bill 2011, proposed by the NAC, has attracted welcome debate. Any legislative measure, intended to correct a historical wrong, should indeed be subject to the closest scrutiny to improve and strengthen it. For if we get this right it can help realise, far better than we have so far, the constitutional guarantees of equality before the law. This bill is built on India’s...

Attacked by the opposition BJP, the Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council has put up a strong defence of its draft communal violence bill. Backing the bill's intentions, the council members have said that the law is intended not to blame the majority community in case of attacks on a 'non-dominant group' but to ensure that the administration works impartially. They said communal and targeted violence spreads mainly when the public officials charged...

For decades, the victims of communal and targeted violence have been denied protections of law that the rest of us take for granted. It's time to end this injustice. In a vibrant and mature democracy, there would be no need to have special laws to prosecute the powerful or protect the weak. If a crime takes place, the law would simply take its course. In a country like ours, however, life...