-Pratirodh.com If Year 2012 earned the sobriquet of “Year of Scams’ due to serial expose of “super social cop” Arvind Kejeriwal, and the year-end tragic death of girl in Delhi gang rape case reminded us about the most ugly manifestation of ‘Republic of Patriarchy’ in India, Year 2013 promises to be a game changer for the fortunes of welfare state in India as well as political fortunes of UPA-2.   If Narendra Modi,...

-Outlook As a debate raged over imposing death penalty for rape convicts, National Commission for Minorities (NCM) opposed such a "blanket provision", saying this would prompt offenders to kill their victims. "The laws concerning rape provisions should be made for enhancement of punishment with imprisonment of life and also liability to fine. A blanket provision for death would prompt offenders to kill their victims, compounding instances of rape and murder," the NCM...

-The Indian Express While a sessions court in Karnataka thought that “one or two beatings is not the kind of cruelty that could drive a woman to commit suicide”, the Supreme Court on Thursday deprecated all kinds of “insensitivity” shown by people as well as judges towards crimes against women. Appealing for no-tolerance towards any sort of physical violence on women, the apex court said that “mindset” of people, including that of...

-The Hindu A former Indian Police Service official, Amod Kanth, has been organising interface sessions between senior Delhi Police officers and juvenile delinquents as part of a reform programme that among other things aims at drawing the two sides together. His non-government organisation ‘Prayas’ is currently organising programmes for 100 juveniles to help the State understand the motive behind crimes and to curb their recurrence. “The programme has 25 per cent juveniles...

-The Hindu The old Penal Code exempts it as an offence if a wife is not under 16 Opposing the death penalty for those guilty of rape, women’s groups have demanded that marital rape, stalking and stripping be regarded as serious offences. The old Penal Code and the proposed amendments exempt marital rape as an offence if a wife is not under 16 years of age. This exemption, totally and unreasonably, ignores the...