-The Telegraph Question Time Didi, organised by CNN-IBN at the Town Hall on Friday evening, was meant to be a platform for Mamata Banerjee to field questions from a cross-section of Calcuttans on the eve of her completing one year as chief minister. But less than 12 minutes and five questions into the event, Mamata stormed off, accusing some students of being “Maoists and CPM cadres”. Taniya Bhardwaj, a Presidency University student...
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Supreme Court should halt undermining of the purpose of setting up an SIT
-The Economic Times The Supreme Court-appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT) has concluded in its final report that it would not amount to an offence even if Gujarat chief ministerNarendra Modi hypothetically did say something about 'allowing Hindus to vent their anger' in a meeting with top police officers after the Godhra carnage in 2002. That is an appalling conclusion. If Modi did actually make that statement, it patently cannot be called...
More »Protect RTI activists
-The Times of India The death of RTI activist Ravinder Balwani following a mysterious hit-and-run incident in the capital has triggered allegations of foul play. The family of the deceased has drawn attention to the numerous death threats Balwani had received in the last one year, about which he had complained to the police. An ex-official of the Delhi Transco Limited and aide of anti-graft crusader Arvind Kejriwal, he used the...
More »Chilling effects and frozen words-Lawrence Liang
While freedom of speech and expression is an individual right, its actualisation often relies on a vast infrastructure of intermediaries. In the offline world, this includes newspapers, television channels, public auditoriums, etc. It is often assumed that the internet has created a more robust public sphere of speech by doing away with many structural barriers to free speech. But the fact of the matter is that even if the internet enables...
More »Shielding whistle blowers: Punjab gives teeth to panel
-Express News Service The Punjab government has decided to include representatives of Home Department, Advocate General’s office and some social activists, including women, as members of the security review committee for grant of protection to whistle blowers. The committee would be headed by the Additional Director General of Police (ADGP), Security. The state submitted this in the Punjab and Haryana High Court through an affidavit filed by Surinder Pal Singh, SSP Security...
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