-Outlook The faecal matter hits the rotary blades, politically-but we're still staring at a sanitation disaster "Indians defecate everywhere. They defecate mostly besides the railway tracks. But they also defecate on the beaches; they defecate on the hills; they defecate on the river banks; they defecate on the streets; they never look for cover." -V.S. Naipaul An Area of Darkness, 1964 Not...

-The Hindu When a death sentence is given to satisfy the "collective conscience of the community," it raises troubling questions about the fairness of the trial The verdict of death for the bestial gang rape in Delhi last December is based on Supreme Court judgments, which stipulate that capital punishment will be imposed in "the rarest of rare" cases, where the community's "collective conscience is so shocked that it will expect the...

-Kafila.org A Preliminary Citizens' Report September 20, 2013 A. On September 17-18, 2013, an 11 member team consisting of both independent activists as well as activists affiliated with 5 organizations based in Lucknow, Chitrakoot, Muzaffarnagar and Delhi visited relief camps in two affected districts of Muzaffarnagar (3 Relief Camps - Madrasa camp at Bassi Kalan, Madrasa camp at Tawli and camp at Haji Aala's house, Shahpur) and Shamli (3 Relief Camps -...

-The Hindu Equating juveniles with adult criminals is neither scientifically correct nor normatively defensible The August 31 verdict of the Juvenile Justice Board (JJB) in the Delhi gang rape case, handing down a bare three-year custodial sentence to the juvenile member, has generated a fresh round of debate on the legality and desirability of juvenile justice itself: why should juveniles above 16 indulging in violent crimes not be treated as adult criminals?...

-The Hindustan Times For the past three years, Kunwar Pal is looking for his missing 12-year-old son. He tries to follow every lead that he gets and travels across the city and nearby towns in the search of his son who went missing in November 2003 from Sangam Vihar in south Delhi. He regularly visits the police station, where he had registered a missing persons' complaint and pastes photos of his son...