Over the past three years, the number of attacks on schools has seen a steep rise. The argument advanced by the Naxals is that schools have become police stations and security forces take cover here. To substantiate their claim they have never attacked a school when children were in it and attacks have always taken place when the school premises were closed. Security personnel who battle the Naxals however claim that...
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Mani Shankar Aiyar joins critics on NREGA working by Sreelatha Menon
Former Union Panchayat Raj Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar, lately in the news for denouncing the Commonwealth Games, is aiming his guns much closer to the UPA government’s heart, at the way it is implementing the flagship National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). He is joining forces with like-minded critics of the Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council (NAC) such as economist-actvist Jean Dreze to drive home the fact that its basic promises...
More »Justice and the Adivasi by Ramachandra Guha
In the summer of 2006, I travelled with a group of scholars and writers through the district of Dantewada, then (as now) the epicentre of the conflict between the Indian State and Maoist rebels. Writing about my experiences in a four-part series published in The Telegraph, I predicted that the conflict would intensify, because the Maoists would not give up their commitment to armed struggle, while the government would not...
More »Communal violence bill: activists, government at loggerheads by Smita Gupta
From the framing of its first draft in 2005 to the heated debates that have followed it, the Communal Violence (Prevention, Control and Rehabilitation of Victims) Bill has been mired in controversy. The government feels that civil society organisations want to take over its powers; civil society organisations believe the government is simply not prepared to go far enough. Now, after five years of back and forth, the National Advisory Council...
More »Why you must read this censored chapter by Raman Kirpal
A RESEARCHER WORKING on the State of Panchayats Report (SOPR) 2008-09 met Mahangu Madiya in Chhattisgarh’s Bastar district, a dangerous place for gathering data. Madiya’s story was startling. In January, he was given Rs 55 lakh compensation for his land, but the amount is sitting in his bank account. He does not even own a mobile phone. “I am concerned with farming. My land is important to me. What will I...
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