Founding Editor: Daya Varma (1929-2015)
Editors: Vinod Mubayi (New York) and Raza Mir (New Jersey).
Editorial Board: Ram Puniyani and Irfan Engineer (Mumbai); Pervez Hoodbhoy (Islamabad); Dolores Chew (Montreal); Vamsi Vakulabharanam (Amherst); Ajay Bhardwaj (Vancouver).
Circulation/website: Feroz Mehdi (On behalf of Alternatives, Montreal).
EXECUTION OF AFZAL GURU: A SHAMEFUL ACT
Vinod Mubayi and Daya Varma
Compounding its shameful act of executing Mohamed Afzal Guru on February 9, 2013, the Government committed a series of equally shameful (and shamefully petty) actions before and after the execution – refusing to let Afzal’s family meet with him before his death, sending the notice of execution to his family via Speed Post instead of a phone call, burying the body in a secret grave inside the jail instead of returning it to the family – and behaved, in general, with a complete lack of transparency so that the condemned man was given no chance to challenge the President’s rejection of his mercy petition, which was constitutionally open to judicial review. Read more…
LET NOT AFZAL GURU EXECUTION BECOME AN EXCUSE TO DISMISS THE JUSTICE VERMA COMMISSION REPORT ON THE STATUS OF WOMEN
Daya Varma and Vinod Mubayi
As stated above, the execution of Afzal Guru was not only a mockery of justice but also a display of inhuman conduct on the part of the government towards the family, especially the wife and the son, of the victim. It was natural and justified that voices against Guru’s execution were raised by the democratic strata of India. Read more…
A MAN WAS HANGED WHO WAS NOT GUILTY BEYOND REASONABLE DOUBT
Anjali Mody
After the December 13, 2001 terrorist attack on Parliament, the government said it was an attack on India’s sovereignty, and those involved would be shown no mercy. Read more…
FAMILY SEEKS PERMISSION FOR PRAYERS IN JAIL
(Delhi: The Hindu, February 10, 2013, day after the hanging of Afzal Guru) (The file photo of Tabassum, wife of Mohammad Afzal Guru not produced)
Hours after the news of his death by hanging broke, Mohammed Afzal Guru’s lawyers Nandita Haksar and N.D. Pancholi made their way to the Tihar Jail here, carrying with them a letter from his family seeking permission to say a prayer at his grave. Guru, who was convicted for the December 2001 attack on Parliament, was hanged and buried inside the heavily fortified Tihar Jail on Saturday morning. Read more…
PUCL STATEMENT ON THE HANGING OF AFZAL GURU
The PUCL condemns the hanging of Afzal Guru in Tihar Jail early in the morning of February 9, 2013.
The tearing hurry with which Afzal Guru was hanged, accompanied by the flouting of all established norms by not giving his family their legal right to meet him before taking him to the gallows, clearly indicates that there were political considerations behind taking this step. Read more…
ON THE MURDER OF 12-YEAR OLD SON OF LTTE LEADER PRABHAKAAN NDMLP
Statement to the Media on the Channel-4 photographs
No lies or distortions can cover up the wicked deeds of the military action carried out by the defence forces of Sri Lanka in the name of “humanitarian war” during the final stages of the war in 2009. Information and evidence about them have already been released by international democratic and human rights organisations. As a continuation of such information, the TV channel, Channel-4 had recently release photographs relating to the killing of the 12-years old son of Prabakaran. Read more…
MY NAME IS KHAN AND… Pain of a celebrity being an Indian Muslim
Ram Puniyani
Shah Rukh Khan is no ordinary celebrity. Being the lead actor with a very vibrant presence on big and small screen makes him to be very much on the top. Recently the communal elements asked him to produce his patriotism certificate. Khan in one of his articles in The New York Times- Outlook Turning Points ((January 2013) suggested that India has a bias against Muslims and goes on to say that “Political leaders have made me a symbol of all that they think is wrong and unpatriotic about Muslims in India.” Read more…
VICTIMS AND VICTIMHOOD (SALMAN RUSHDIE)
Jawed Naqvi
Salman Rushdie, a much-feted victim of intolerance, was vigorously promoting his memoir recently when I asked a friend in London to send me a copy of The Rushdie Letters. Read more…
ANTI-MODI PROTESTERS AT DELHI UNIVERSITY ALLEGE MANHANDLING
(The Hindu New Delhi, February 7, 2013
The Hindu Protesters raising slogans against Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi during his visit to Shri Ram College of Commerce in New Delhi on Wednesday. Read more…
THIRTY-FOUR PERCENT OF CHILDREN IN GUJARAT ARE UNDERNOURISHED: NGO
(February 7, 2013)
NGO ‘Wada Na Todo Abhiyan’ said it has analysed the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) data of Gujarat and found that 34.05 per cent children in the state fall under various categories of under-nourishment. Read more…
DHULE VIOLENCE: CHANGING ANATOMY OF COMMUNAL VIOLENCE
Ram Puniyani
The violence in Dhule Maharashtra seems to be the new face of communal violence in India. As per the report of a major national daily (Jan 26, 2013), the evidence with the newspaper shows the evidence of police looting and destroying the property. The video clips in possession of the civil society groups also show one police official exhorting the rioting mob to move on. So far even if it was there it was not so blatantly clear. One sensed the partisan nature of police as discerned through different inquiry commission reports, but this type of role of police is a new and downhill chapter in the history of communal violence in India. Read more…
DRUG RESEARCH RIDDLED WITH HALF TRUTHS, OMISSIONS, LIES
Excerpted from Bad Pharma: How Drug Companies Mislead Doctors and Harm Patients (2012) by Ben Goldacre
Sponsors get the answer they want.
Before we get going, we need to establish one thing beyond any doubt: Industry-funded trials are more likely than independently funded trials to produce a positive, flattering result. This is our core premise, and one of the most well-documented phenomena in the growing field of “research about research”. It has also become much easier to study in recent years because the rules on declaring industry funding have become a little clearer. Read more…
ISRAEL MUST WITHDRAW ALL SETTLERS OR FACE ICC, SAYS UN REPORT
Alternatives International Journal (Friday 1 February 2013)
Harriet Sherwood
Israel must withdraw all settlers from the West Bank or potentially face a case at the International Criminal Court (ICC) for serious violations of international law, says a report by a United Nations agency that was immediately dismissed in Jerusalem as “counterproductive and unfortunate.” Read more…
RAVI SHANKAR (7 April 1920 – 11 December 2012)
T.K. Raghunathan (Kabir Cultural Center, Montreal)
“I still remember the first time I saw him. He was coming down the stairs, he was so handsome and godlike that I was just frozen to the spot.” – Sukanya Rajan, Wife as told to Kavita Chhibber Read more…
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