-The Hindu People of different faiths must find a fit between their own distinctive way of reaching the ultimate and a common, basic framework for living together A Minister of the West Bengal government, Siddiqullah Chowdhury, reportedly remarked recently that for Muslims, “our holy scripture, the Quran Sharif, is supreme and if any constitutional provision... contradicts the Quran, then our scripture will prevail and not the Constitution”. This statement is deeply condemnable...
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Where's the money coming from? -Arun Kumar (Book review)
-The Indian Express Exploring the role of the black economy in political finance and how it subverts democracy. Book: Costs of democracy: Political Finance in India Editors: Devesh Kapur & Milan Vaishnav Publisher: Oxford University Press Page: 311 Price: Rs 750 Money in politics is an issue of great concern for the Indian polity. Most believe it undermines democracy in India so that what formally looks like a great democracy turns out to be just...
More »Bezwada Wilson, national convenor of the Safai Karamchari Andolan, interviewed by Ahan Penkar
-Caravan Magazine On 9 September 2018, five sanitation workers died due to inhalation of toxic fumes while cleaning a sewage tank in West Delhi. Several media reports regarding the incident noted that the men did not have any safety gear, indicating that the unavailability of equipment led to their death. The police reportedly registered a case against theengineer who was in charge of managing the sewage tank,under Sections 304 and 304A...
More »The social value of religious and political dissent -Rajeev Bhargava
-The Hindu Dissenters of the past in India were great moral agitators, introducing social, intellectual and spiritual turbulence in public life. Would they have survived today? Dissent is not only the “safety valve of democracy”, as Justice D.Y. Chandrachud reminded us, but vital for meaningful social life. Societies stultify when everyone converges on a single opinion or when official stories go unchallenged. Flaws congeal and social rot sets in. Right or wrong,...
More »Disagreeing With Govt Not Sedition; People Have the Right to Criticise: Law Commission
-TheWire.in New Delhi: Criticising the country or a particular aspect of it cannot be treated as “sedition” and the charge of sedition can only be invoked in cases where the intention is to overthrow the government with violence and illegal means, the Law Commission has observed in a consultation paper on the subject. The commission, headed by Justice (retired) B.S. Chauhan, also noted that in order to study the revision of Section...
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