-Press Release by All India Forum of Forest Movements (AIFFM), dated February 22, 2019 On 13 February, the Supreme Court of India, hearing a decade-old petition challenging the constitutional validity of the Forest Rights Act, 2006, ordered that forest dwellers whose claims for recognition of forest rights have been rejected would have to be evicted in a summary and time-bound manner. The order contains separate instructions for each state government to...

-The Hindu Opposition parties must make a new anti-torture legislation part of their common programme Custodial torture is global, old and stubborn. Dismemberment was a method of torture practised with vigour in ancient India, crushing-by-elephant-foot another. The Arthashastra prescribes mental torture through swear-words with or without physical assaults. Death by a thousand cuts was ancient China’s speciality. The Tang Code (652 CE) describes judicial torture in detail. Ancient Japanese methods of torture...

-Business Standard Congress president's letters to chief ministers of Chhattisgarh, MP and Rajasthan asks them to 'review the implementation' of the Land Acquisition Act. Congress president Rahul Gandhi has asked the party’s chief ministers in Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh to undo changes that previous BJP governments made to the land acquisition law and related regulations. Gandhi has written letters asking the chief ministers to ensure that the rights of tribals and forest-dwellers...

-The Hindu Important bills were passed; but going forward there must be debate on the anti-defection law The 16th Lok Sabha had its final sitting last Wednesday, marking an end to a disappointing five-year period. This Lok Sabha was surpassed only by the preceding one in terms of the low number of hours it worked. It met for 1,615 hours, 40% lower than all full-term Parliaments. This shows a decline in the...

-The Hindu The regulatory framework must be reformed to ensure access to safe and sufficient blood A ready supply of safe blood in sufficient quantities is a vital component of modern health care. In 2015-16, India was 1.1 million units short of its blood requirements. Here too, there were considerable regional disparities, with 81 districts in the country not having a blood bank at all. In 2016, a hospital in Chhattisgarh turned...