-The Telegraph The debate around Yakub Memon’s hanging highlights the many cases of people who were hanged but who should have lived. Indeed, the Supreme Court admitted in 2009 that it had wrongly sentenced 15 people to death in 15 years. Avijit Chatterjee looks at some cases It was a mistake, the Supreme Court later said. But by then it was too late. Ravji Rao, or Ram Chandra, had been hanged to...
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Policy with a farmer’s face -Ashok Gulati
-The Indian Express It is necessary to rescue public policy from its elitist bias, bring agriculture to its centre There is seldom any Independence Day speech where the prime minister, from the ramparts of the Red Fort, does not thank the jawans and kisans for their heroic role in securing our borders and ensuring food security. This year is unlikely to be different. Recall Lal Bahadur Shastri’s famous slogan, “Jai Jawan,...
More »Death penalty files ‘lost, eaten by termites’ -Pradeep Thakur & Himanshi Dhawan
-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Records of death penalty convicts who have been executed since independence have gone missing from many prisons with the National Law University (NLU), conducting a first of its kind study, able to confirm data related to 755 executions since 1947. "Some prison authorities have written to us that either the records have been lost or destroyed by termites," NLU director Anup Surendranath told TOI, who is...
More »Social justice on social media? -Amulya Gopalakrishnan
-The Times of India In recent months, racial violence has been foregrounded in the US, with the Charleston incident in which nine black church-goers were gunned down and other incidents of police brutality that are no longer possible to deny. And all of a sudden, Black Twitter has become a preoccupation with the US media, reminding it of its own evasions. Hashtags around race like #icantbreathe #Blacklivesmatter found their way into many...
More »Why teachers matter -Sanjay Gupta & Priya Viswanath
-The Hindu How the RightToRead programme focusses on making teachers an integral part of the learning process. The teacher crisis in India is well known but not spoken about as much. It is estimated our government schools are in need of 5.9 lakh primary-level teachers and 3.5 lakh upper primary-level teachers. By 2030, this number is projected to increase further. There is also the need for skills training so that the effectiveness...
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