-The Hindu The sense of impunity that drives discrimination against Dalits is at the heart of recent demands for the dilution, or even repeal, of the Act for prevention of atrocities against SCs and STs It is the sense of impunity nurtured by caste hierarchy that prepares the social ground for the “shockingly cruel and inhumane” crimes against Dalits called atrocities. It is this impunity that the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled...

-Hindustan Times Toronto: A culture of intolerance has taken root in India and grown “more menacing” since Narendra Modi became Prime Minister two years ago, according to a new report prepared jointly by a Canadian university and global writers group PEN International. India must overhaul its antiquated laws and cumbersome legal system, which are increasingly being misused to silence dissent, said the report titled “Fearful Silence: The Chill on India’s Public Sphere”. It...

-Hindustan Times The funding for and motivations of NGOs have often been a bone of contention between the government and civil society. So it is a positive move that the Supreme Court (SC) has stepped in and decided to review laws governing NGOs with the aim of looking into the adequacy of the regulatory mechanism to prevent financial irregularities and ensuring that funds are used for the stated goals. This has...

-The Hindu The number of FIRs registered against personnel is few and far between, show new data from NCRB New Delhi: India may not have enough safeguards to protect its citizens from human rights violations by the police, official data suggest. As many as 35,831 cases were registered against the police with the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) in 2015-16, a figure that experts say is highly under-reported. And only 94 first information...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Centre and National Human Rights Commission clashed in the Supreme Court on Wednesday over the panel's plea to make its recommendations in human rights violations cases, including those by the armed forces, binding on the Centre and state governments. "Unless the recommendations of the human rights panel are given binding status, the whole exercise of conducting an inquiry or investigation by a body like NHRC...