Ranjan Daimary faction of the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) on Thursday issued fresh threat to all communities residing in the Bodo belt, security forces or “other Indian communities” warning of more “heinous and horrible results” if they make “any mistake or crime against the NDFB.” The fresh warning came after three days of serial killings by the outfit in which 24 civilians, majority of them Hindi-speaking people, were killed...

Two Adivasi student organisations today burnt the effigies of Assam water resources minister Prithvi Majhi, Lok Sabha MP Joseph Toppo and Rajya Sabha MP Silvius Condopan, all hailing from their community, in protest against the trio’s “silence” over the eviction drive at Ripu-Chirang reserve forest. The All Adivasi students Association of Assam and the All Santhali students Union alleged that the leaders were indifferent to the plight of the community. They...

To standardise implementation of the Right to Education Act (RTE) and to dispel misconceptions surrounding it, the government has decided to issue a rulebook to schools across Maharashtra with easy to follow guidelines. Though it was introduced in 2009, the state has now devised the draft rules to simplify the jargon-loaded Act. “Many schools have misunderstood the Act or are confused about its implementation. Earlier, we had issued government regulations (GRs) that...

A Dalit-dominated hamlet in remote area of Uttar Pradesh (UP) is on the radar of top officials of the Mayawati administration nowadays. At the crux of their interest is a new goddess ‘Angrezi Devi’. Construction of a temple consecrated to this goddess of English is in full swing in Jang Bahadur Ganj village of Lakhimpur Kheri district. But tension has already begun to simmer over this unique campaign to popularise English...

Every afternoon at about four, a slight woman named Runi slips out of the cramped, airless room that she shares with her husband and their sixteen children. She skirts the drainage ditch in front of the building, then walks toward the pile of hardened dung cakes that people in this slum on the edge of the northeastern Indian city of Patna use for fuel. Dressed in a bright-yellow sari shot...