Monday, June 30, 2014

It showcases the political obscene class all the way.

The photo is a realistic interpratation of power politics,which is antipeople all the way.It showcases the political obscene class all the way.Those who feel hurt,should see other posts online.I am sorry that I used the photo without commenting on it.

It was thunder and rain during last day in Kolkata.Since PC was struck twice earlier ,could not risk it once again.Escape opted skipping all kinds of download.No Hindi tool at home.Cable link remained disconnected ound the clock.Afraid,it would continue this season.May not connect everyone nor reply everyone.Sorry.

क्या अपनी चिता रचने को तैयार हैं हम? जल जंगल जमीन आजीविका के लिए।

http://ambedkaractions.blogspot.in/2014/06/blog-post_1760.html



Saturday, June 28, 2014

Upendra Kushwaha's request for private secretary denied

http://media2.intoday.in/indiatoday//images/2153/130124070010_Khuswaha_385.jpgLeader of Rashtriya Lok Samata Party, Upendra Kushwaha's request for private secretary has been denied. Kushwaha, the Union Minister of State Minister for Rural Development, Panchayati Raj and Drinking Water and Sanitation had recommended the name of Ravinder Kumar as his private secretary to the Appointment Committee of Cabinet. But the Prime Minister has not approved the proposal of the Department of Rural Development for appointment of Ravinder Kumar as Private Secretary". Kumar, a resident of Bihar, is a 2011 batch IAS officer of Sikkim cadre.

The Prime Minister had earlier put on hold the appointment of private secretaries of Home Minister Rajnath Singh and some other union ministers.

Kushwaha is a Member of Parliament From Karakat in Bihar. He is a former JDU member of Rajya Sabha.  He has been the leader of opposition in Bihar Assembly.

Friday, June 27, 2014

IB report on NGOs in contempt of Supreme Court: Justice Sachar


Report “misleading”, defamatory and factually incorrect   
New Delhi: Commemorating the 39th anniversary of imposition of Emergency at Indian Women's Press Corps (IWPC), Jantar Mantar and Gandhi Peace Foundation, Justice Rajinder Sachar, former Chief Justice, Delhi High Court repeatedly expressed his outrage at the manner which the so –called Intelligence Bureau (IB) report has committed contempt court of the Supreme Court, the Delhi High Court and the Parliament. He asked, “will IB decide or law will decide?” whether or not organizations named in the report are complying with the report. He said, this agency has transgressed its jurisdiction.   

He raised the issue of Delhi High Court’s verdict on the funding of Congress and BJP by the London based Vedanta company and how protest against such a company can be deemed anti-development and anti-national.  He said, “like a sensible businessman”, Vedanta funded both the ruling party and the opposition party. It is not surprising that IB is speaking on their behalf.   

Kavitha Krishnan, noted social and women rights activist underlined how there is no conflict between development and environment but in a strange application of logic IB report will have us believe that they who defend environment are anti-national and they who speak for development are patriotic. 

Sanjay Parikh, Advocate, Supreme Court who has fought most the cases named in the IB report on behalf of social organizations wondered that so far he has been pursuing these cases in national interest and for the future generations. But now IB report in its wisdom contends that they who work for environmental protection are anti-national and anti-development.

On the issue of IB report’s section on GMOs (genetically modified/engineered organisms), he said that the IB report by making specific mention of the Supreme Court cases and influencing  Court-appointed Technical Expert Committee Report (TEC) has committed contempt of court. 

The IB report attributes motives to the Parliamentary Standing Committee Report which is akin to interfering with the parliamentary process.

He wondered as to IB report will justify its reliance on the opinion of Dr Ronald Herring of Cornell University who promotes GMOs and the monopoly of Monsanto. How can Government of India be blind to the design of the global GMO seed industry which wants to tame India’s regulators to approve GMOs, by-passing scientific, transparent and independent safety testing. 

If India's intelligence agencies become instruments of global corporations working against the public interest and national interest of India, our national security is under threat.

This IB report is deeply anti-national and subversive of constitutional rights of citizens in our country.  It does India no credit.

Justice Sachar noted as to how the Prime Minister has been misled by the IB’s report because it does not disclose the verdict of the Delhi High Court dated 10.09.2013 in the matter of Indian Social Action Forum and the compliance order of Ministry of Home Affairs dated October 9, 2013. Someone in IB must be held accountable for this grave act misleading the government.   

Gopal Krishna of Citizens Forum for Civil Liberties (CFCL) argued as to how does IB infer that allowing our country to become a dustbin for the hazardous wastes of the developed countries is in national interest. India generates so much hazardous wastes of its own. It has not been able to manage it till date and has no blue print to do so in future. How is allowing of hazardous wastes in the country in national interest and for national development. How can colonization of Alang beach for dumping of end-of-life ships in Indian waters by ship owning countries of the developed world be deemed an act of patriotism? IB’s report fails to recognize that Government of India has a legal obligation to ban hazardous waste trade in compliance with the Supreme Court order, UN’s Basel Convention to which India is a signatory and Ban Amendment.  If the report in question is indeed from the IB then its acceptance of Lawrence Summers’ Principle is indefensible and anti-national because it originated from a 1991 memo by Lawrence Summers, former Chief Economist of the World Bank. In this memo, he promoted dumping toxic waste in the Third World for economic reasons: “Just between you and me, shouldn’t the World Bank be encouraging more migration of the dirty industries to the LDCs [Least Developed Countries]? […] A given amount of health impairing pollution should be done in the country with the lowest cost, which will be the country with the lowest wages. I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that.” This principle advanced the argument of transfer of harm to the developing countries and externalization of human and environmental costs. This is essentially the principle from the colonial era which cannot be accepted in national interest. 

On the issue of Par-Tapi-Narmada link project which part of Interlinking of Rivers (ILR) project, Gopal Krishna argued as to how can diversion of rivers be allowed in the name of development without learning lessons from Ara sea disaster which dried because of diversion of two Siberian rivers. How can the resolution of Kerala Assembly rejecting ILR project be ignored? How can Prof. S R Hashim Commission report of September 1999 that rejected linking of Himalayan and Peninsular rivers be forgotten? Is it in national interest to ignore the fact that Brahmaputra, Ganga and Kosi are transboundary rivers? Rivers are “veins and arteries” of nature, is it in national interest to allow their mutilation in the name of ILR? Aren’t such initiatives climate insensitive and outdated as they were conceived where climate crisis was not yet an admitted reality? IB report fails to appreciate these issues of far reaching implications.         

A Statement of Concern signed by many eminent personalities, academicians, human right activists, concerned citizens etc. from all over India against this so-called IB report was shared with the media. The statement titled "Uphold Sustainable Development! Condemn `Foreign Funded’ Destructive Development Promoted by IB expressed deep shock “at the dubious methods used by the Intelligence Bureau (IB) of the Home Ministry of India, to discredit many important social activists in the country who have committed their lives in social action for years.  For a long time, these activists have consistently questioned the destructive path of development India is following and have demanded a model of sustainable and equitable development which does not harm the environment, local communities, culture and the future generations.”



Uphold Sustainable Development!

Condemn `Foreign Funded’ Destructive Development Promoted by IB!

We, the undersigned, are deeply shocked at the dubious methods used by the Intelligence Bureau (IB) of the Home Ministry of India, to discredit many important social activists in the country who have committed their lives in social action for years.  For a long time, these activists have consistently questioned the destructive path of development India is following and have demanded a model of sustainable and equitable development which does not harm the environment, local communities, culture and the future generations.

For obvious reasons, the IB has selected activists connected with issues like POSCO, genetically modified food, nuclear energy, etc and branded their promotion as `development for the nation’ and those activists who question the un-sustainability, environmental implications, the impact on livelihood of thousands people and other social costs of such `proven disasters’ have been named `foreign funded’ activists trying to block India’s development. We condemn the IB report on the following reasons:

1.       IB report is a calculated character assassination attempt on a large number of credible activists in this country including Admiral Ramdas, Justice P K Mishra, Medha Patkar,  Dr. SP Udayakumar, Achin Vanaik, Praful Bidwai, Prashant Paikray, K. P Sasi, Dr. Surendra Gadekhar, Babloo Loitongbam, Lalita Ramdas, Late Banwarilal Sharma, Late Fr. Tom Kochery, Aarti Chokshi, M G Devasahayam, Aruna Rodrigues, Kavita Kuruganti and others. We understand that the present government is planning to execute a major corporate agenda of destroying India’s land, water and forests. Therefore, this slander campaign is only to clear the ground to benefit the Indian and foreign multinational interests.

2.       We strongly oppose the use of the term `foreign’ to describe credible activists of this country. We consider it as only a political gimmick to facilitate the real `foreign’ interests.

3.       Among the issues mentioned is POSCO which is already discredited very badly in India and abroad and this multinational company is investing one of the largest `foreign’ investments of Rs. 54,000 Crores, causing large scale livelihood problems and displacement of tens of thousands of fisher folk, farmers, Dalits and Adivasis. This `foreign funded’ project is also violating all norms of existing laws of protection of the forests under the Forest Rights Act and protection of the coastal lands under Coastal Regulation Zone Notification and many rights of women and children. The draconian project is also responsible for throwing over hundred bombs on the struggling villagers and over 100 people have been shot in peaceful protests. We extend our full solidarity and support to the local villagers against this `mega foreign funded’ project.

4.       Among the other issues mentioned, the people’s movement against Koodankulam nuclear plant is noteworthy. Perhaps the IB should check the developments of nuclear plants in Japan, Germany, the United States and other countries and explore the reasons for why they are closing down the operations on nuclear energy due to large scale social and environmental disasters followed by large scale protests of people against such destructive developmental projects even in these `foreign’ countries whose nuclear technology is more advanced than what is there in India. IB should also understand that the immediate effects of radiation due to Koodankulam nuclear plants will be on southern Tamil Nadu, Southern Kerala and Northern Kerala and if the IB wish to lead a life without cancer and genetic disorders for their children and their own future generations, it is most advisable that they remove their officials from this `foreign’ initiated nuclear plant. The IB should have the minimum intelligence to understand that you suffere from cancer and Down syndrome due to radiation from any `foreign’ installation like Chernobyl, Fukushima,Three Mile Island or a nuclear plant in Koodankulam. The health effects and the environmental impacts are similar. We hereby extend our full solidarity to the struggle of the brave villagers of Koodankulam under the leadership of Dr. S P Udayakumar.

5.       The other issue which is mentioned in the report is GM (Genetically Modified)) crops. The hazards of such crops are well known in India as well as abroad. The interests of such development is only for the `foreign’ multinationals like Monsanto. While the IB has assumed all these destructive projects as `national interests’, it has conveniently ignored the objections to GM crops by the Moratorium Orders of Shri Jairam Ramesh, the Parliamentary Standing Committee Report and the Supreme Court-appointed Technical Expert Committee Report (TEC) because they have found that GM crops have little to contribute to Indian agriculture, safe food and food security in this country. We bring to your notice that IB has no business to indirectly facilitate a foreign multinational company like Monsanto and malign the credibility of activists who are raising the question of large scale potential disaster to this nation due to GM crops.

6.       Singling out “activism against Extractive Industries in North East” as a separate issue in the report,  painting legitimate and democratic people’s development related activities and the struggle to stop mass extrajudical executions in the Supreme Court by local organizations as anti-national and anti-development amounts to a deeply discriminatory slant. A number of false, unfounded allegations such as “routing of foreign funds” have been raised without any rational or factual basis naming two NGOs of Manipur and linking them to other organizations at the national level in an imagined association that is untrue. On the other hand there is no “Manipur Coalition of Extractives” as alleged in this report. The IB report is concocted by uninformed sources.

7.       The document of IB report which was classified as a `secret report’ was released by the IB itself to the press with an agenda to malign, scandalize and create a character assassination of credible activists in this country. We strongly condemn such dubious methods.

8.       As far as the few NGOs mentioned are concerned, it is clear that the IB has conveniently selected them due to their stands on the above issues and it has nothing to do with foreign fund. The Intelligence Bureau knows that there are over 40,000 NGOs operating in this country and they never objected to the visit of Narendra Modi for blessings to  one of the largest foreign funded NGO under Mata Amritandamayi, a well known hub of RSS activists. IB had no problem when even BBC reported that large scale foreign fund was diverted by the NGO called Vanavasi Kalyan Kendra, another hub of the Sangh Parivar, for the brutal murder of over 2000 innocent Muslims in Gujarat. Therefore, it is obvious that the IB is facilitating a political game rather than serving any national interest.

9.       We would also like to bring to your notice that the space for criticisms of any Government is a crucial space which is fundamental to any democracy. What the IB is attempting to do is to block this important critical space which is against long-term national interests.

10.   We are aware that thousands of crores of rupees are regularly being spent on the unaccountable and illegitimate intelligence agencies in this country and such financial resources collected from the tax payers’ money in this country is ultimately getting used against the rights of the citizens of this country. The present IB report is a classic example. We demand a drastic cut of such financial resources which are regularly used against the rights of the minorities, Dalits, Adivasis, the people’s movements and activists in this country for the preservation and sustainance of democracy. We also demand  that all the financial resources used by the intelligence agencies be brought under public audit and be reported to the Indian Parliament so that such institutions also realize that there is a public accountability which rests on them.

11.   We demand that immediate action on all those officials be undertaken for executing such criminal behavior and misusing their official powers.

Due to all the above reasons, we are convinced that the IB report is only a politically motivated instrument of the vested interests in this country. We strongly condemn the public use of IB against activists, people’s movements and credible journalists.

We appeal to all members of the civil society to condemn the IB report and strengthen the people’s movements for they are the only source and hope for the survival of our future, despite the interventions of irresponsible politicians and irresponsible intelligence departments.

We appeal to all members of the civil society to uphold sustainable and equitable development, no matter what the authorities speak of destructive foreign motivated development as `national interest’!

We appeal to all members of the civil society to speak up against the suppression of critical voices, without which in the final analysis, freedom of all individuals will be at stake very soon.
 
Prof. Romila Thapar
Dr. Mallika Sarabhai, artist and activist
Mahesh Bhatt - film director, producer
Maj Gen (Retd) S.G.Vombatkere
Vrinda Grover - Lawyer - Supreme Court of India
Anand Patwardhan, film maker
Buddhadev Dasgupta, filmmaker.
Prof KN Panikkar, historian
Aruna Roy
Sandeep Pande, activist
V Suresh, National General Secretary, PUCL
Dr(Brig) R S Rajan (Director, Vivekananda Institute for Leadership Development, Mysore)
Dr P M Bhargava (Molecular Biologist & Former Member, National Security Advisory Board; GoI)
Manisha Sethi, Associate Professor, Jamia Milia Islamia Univesity
K. Satchidanhandan, Ex Chairperson, Kendra Sahitya Academi
Ajit Shahi, Former Editor, Tehelka
Goutam Ghosh, film maker
Kavita Krishnan, Secretary AIPWA
Sadanand Menon, art critic, journalist.
Kedar Misra (Poet and journalist, Odisha)
S. N. M. Abdi, journalist
Debabrata Roy Laifungbam, Convenor, Civil Society Coaliation on Human Rights in Manipur and the UN
Raja Sen, filmmaker
Sunanda Mukhopadhyay, Chairperson - West Bengal Women's Commission.
Malini Bhattacharya, ex MP.
P Baburaj, film maker
Leena Manimekalai, Poet, Filmmaker
Amar Kanwar - film maker
Kshetrimayum Onil, Just Peace Foundation, Manipur
Kavita Srivastava, National Secretary, PUCL
Prof. Mihir Bhattacharya
R.P. Amudhan, Film Maker
Bidyarthi Chatterji, film Critic.
J Devika, historian, social critic & feminist
Teesta Setalvad
Sohini Dasgupta, filmmaker.
K R Mohan, former Chairperson, Kerala Chalachitra Academi
Gopal Menon, film maker
B. Suresh (film Director & play writer)
Sadique Hossain, Yuva Sahitya Academy Award Winner Author.
Ashok Viswanathan, filmmaker.
T V Chandran - film maker.
Prof A Marx - writer, critic.
Sampad Mohapatra -Journalist,Odisha
Soumitra Dastidar, documentary maker,columnist.
Sudarshana Chakraborty, Journalist,documentary maker.
Dr. Ram Puniyani
Pradosh Pattanaik., Journalist, Ex Editor of "The Samaja "premier Odisha daily.
Bhabani Charan Pattanaik.-Freedom Fighter and Ex Rajyasabha member.
Fr . Jimmy C Dabhi (Human Development & Research Centre, Ahmedabad)
Ramdas Rao, PUCL, Karnataka
Rabi Das-Senior Journalist ,Odisha.
Babloo Loitongbam, Executive Director, Human Rights Alert, Imphal
Basantakumar Wareppa, Lawyer, Manipur
Mary Beth Senate, Rural Women's Upliftment Society, Manipur
Renu Takhelambam, President, Extrajudicial Execution Victim Families Assocaition, Manipur

Shabnam Hashmi
Joy Chingakham, Vice President FRIENDS, Manipur
Nandini Thockchom, Forum for Indigenous Perpective and Action, Manipur
Leishangthem Ranjana, Forum for Indigenous Perpective and Action, Manipur
U Nobokishore, North East Dialogue Forum, Manipur
O. J. Metei, United NGO Mission Manipur
Dr. Vijayamma, journalist & feminist
Jagadish Chandra, activist, Bangalore
Dr. Swarajit Jana, social activist.
BRP Bhaskar, activist, Kerala
Civic Chandran, activist, Kerala
Prof. K.P. Jayasankar
Dr. Vinod Vyasulu
Prof. Anjali Monteiro
K R Seshadri
Subhodip Maitra, writer, journalist, cultural activist.
Ambrose Pinto
Prafulla Samantara
Dr. T T Sreekumar, Assoc. Prof. & Chair, FPM-C, Mudra Institute of Communications, Ahmedabad
Sudhir Patnaik, editor/journalist
G R Vidyaranya, Social & RTI Activist, Mysore
Syed Tanveeruddin, RTI, Human Rights and Social Activist, Mysore 
Prof. Moidul Islam
Prof. Barnali Ghosh
Arundhati Duru, activist
and many others.


Anjani Kumar Singh appointed as new Chief Secretary

Bihar government has appointed 1980-batch IAS officer Anjani Kumar Singh as the new Chief Secretary.

Singh is currently posted as Principal Secretary to Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi. He will take charge after the present chief secretary Ashok Kumar Sinha retires on June 30, 2014.

The state government has promoted 1981-batch IAS S K Negi to the chief secretary rank and appointed him as the Development Commissioner of Bihar.

Negi is currently officiating as the principal secretary of vigilance department. His place will be taken by
another officer from the same batch C Lalsawta, who has been transferred from his current post of advisor, Bihar State Planning Board.

Principal Secretary of the Health Department, Deepak Kumar has been appointed the Principal Secretary to the chief minister. He will retain the charge of the Health Department.

The additional charge of Officer on Special Duty (OSD) to the chief minister has been taken away from Kumar and given to Amrit Lal Meena, 1989 batch officer and Principal Secretary, Agriculture department. He also has the additional charge of Principal Secretary, Sugarcane Industry Department.

Alok Kumar Sinha has been made the Chief Advisor, Bihar State Planning Board. He is a 1976-batch IAS officer.

Narendra Kumar Sinha, Principal Secretary of Information Technology (IT) department, has been appointed as IT advisor. He is 1980-batch IAS officer.

Bihar Staff Selection Commission Chairman JRK Rao of 1985 batch has been given the charge of the IT department.

Source: PTI

Bihar cops sentenced for killing students

Bihar cops sentenced for killing students, but official data vastly underestimates police atrocities
 
The number of zeroes in the National Crime Records Bureau’s tables on human rights violations by the police make it seem like India is blissfully free of police atrocities.
 

The courts have been catching up with errant policemen this month. On Tuesday, a Patna court sentenced a Bihar police officer to death and awarded life imprisonment to seven other policemen for killing three college students in a fake encounter in 2002.

Earlier in the month, on June 6, 18 Uttarakhand cops were convicted for killing an innocent man in custody in 2009. Of these, 17 were sentenced to life imprisonment.

The last major case of convictions in a case of police violence was in March 2013, when eight policemen were declared guilty 31 years after they shot 12 innocent villagers and one senior police officer in a fake encounter in Uttar Pradesh’s Gonda district.

These convictions are especially noteworthy because the Indian government’s official crime records claim to have just a handful of cases of human rights violations by the police.

If the statistics provided by the National Crime Records Bureau are to be believed, there were just 205 cases of the police violating citizens’ human rights across all of India in 2012, just 72 cases in 2011 and a mere 37 cases in 2010.

The different types of violations listed by the NCRB include fake encounter killings, torture, extortion, illegal detention, atrocities against Scheduled Castes and even indignity to women. While very few cases are usually registered under these categories, there is an undefined category of ‘others’ under which most violations are registered.

According to these figures, there was one fake encounter case in India in the five years from 2008 to 2012, and just 22 cases of the police misbehaving with women during the same period. In fact, the many zeroes in NCRB’s tables on human rights violations by the police would make it seem like India is almost blissfully free of police atrocities. Here is a section of the NCRB data from 2010:

Meanwhile, conviction figures in these cases tend to fluctuate wildly. There are some years in which several pending cases are pronounced upon by the courts. In 2012, the last year for which the NCRB has published data, there were no convictions at all:

For lawyers and activists working in the field of human rights, these official figures are grossly unrealistic, but not surprising. The low numbers of cases registered against police personnel reflect the unwillingness of the force to implicate itself in these crimes, as well as the reluctance of victims, for various reasons, to complain about atrocities.

“If the police do not consider certain kinds of human rights violations as violations, they are not likely to register those complaints,” said Shabnam Hashmi, the founding trustee of Anhad, a non-profit human rights forum. Every time there is a terror attack, says Hashmi, several innocent youngsters are picked up and tortured in custody.

“It is done in the name of terrorism and the police do not recognise this as any kind of violation," she said. "If those youth are let off years later, they don’t go back to change the official statistics on police atrocities.”

On several occasions, however, victims do not even attempt to file cases against police personnel who violate their rights. At times, this is because of ignorance.

“Torture in custody is a norm across India, even for minor cases like theft,” said Mumbai-based social activist Vernon Gonsalves. “But the opposition to police torture is not very strong, because many people think men in uniform have the right to abuse them.”

Similarly, it is illegal for the police to detain a citizen for questioning for more than 24 hours, but people are routinely detained without arrest for days across Indian police stations. “The vast majority of people are unaware that this is illegal, and some are too scared of the police to complain,” said Gonsalves.

The fear of reporting police crimes is not unfounded. Gonsalves says that any complaint against the police is investigated by the officers of the same area, often at the same police station where the violation may have occurred. Complaints can be made to the State Human Rights Commissions, but most victims have neither access to good legal aid or knowledge about these commissions.

Despite this, several complaints against police crimes are directed to various Human Rights Commissions. In March, the chairman of the National Human Rights Commission stated that the NHRC received around 1.1 lakh complaints of human rights violations across the country in 2013, of which 34% were cases of violations by police personnel. This would mean that the NHRC received more than 36,000 complaints against the police in just one year, a figure that is completely incongruent with the average figures put out by the NCRB each year.

The problem, according to some activists, is the process of data collection itself. The NCRB gets its data by writing to the home departments of different states, who then write to the state police chief, who in turn asks for the data from each district. The coordination between different levels up and down this chain is very poor.

“The NCRB has no mechanism to verify the figures it receives, but it still has to publish them,” said Maja Daruwala, director of the non-profit Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative. “The figures may therefore be doubtful, but they are all we have to rely on.”

http://scroll.in/article/668171/Bihar-cops-sentenced-for-killing-students,-but-official-data-vastly-underestimates-police-atrocities