Cedric Prakash By Our Representative A major controversy is all set to break out over verbal threats issued by Goa chief minister Manohar Parrikar against Gujarat-based Jesuit human rights activist Father Cedric Prakash. Accusing Prakash of of “spreading religious discontent” during the elections, Parrikar justified police action against Facebooker Devu Chodankar following his anti-Narendra Modi posts, saying "similar action should have been taken against Prakash too." Prakash has called the Goa CM’s statement “extremely mischievous and very unfortunate”, saying, he enjoyed freedom of speech “both in Gujarat and in other parts of India”, as Parrikar, in airing his views on Modi's policies.

By Tathya Macwan*   A few days ago, I decided to visit the famous Gir forest, which is known as the only habitat of the Asiatic lion. Instead of adopting the usual “official” route to spot the big cat through a sponsored tourist operator, which is what most people do, I decided – along with a friend and a relative – to move into the forest on our own. We hired a bike at a town called Jetpur, where I got down early in the morning following a long and tedious night-long journey in a state transport bus. We began our 71-km-long trip on the bike at around 9.30 am to reach Satadhar, a village bordering the Gir forest, where we were to spend our night at a farmhouse belonging to the relative of my friend, who had accompanied me from all the way from Anand. Here, we could easily see the thick forest, just next to the farmhouse. I went around a little, reached a small dam in the neighbourhood, photographed a crocodile, which emerged from the water body, and returned. We were asked to ...

Rajagopalan (right) near his office in Gandhinagar By Our Representative In a major order, chief information commissioner (CIC), Gujarat, D Rajagopalan, has asked the Gujarat High Court to furnish all the necessary details sought by Kalpeshkumar L Gupta, under the right to information (RTI) Act, regarding “monitoring system” set up by the High Court on cases that are being fought in courts in Gujarat. The High Court’s public information officer (PIO), who is supposed to hear RTI cases, had rejected Gupta’s plea on July 2, 2012, saying, the information sought does not come “within the definition of information under the RTI Act.”

By Our Representative Former village head Mulabhai Hamirbhai Parmar, a Dalit from Mota Hadmatiya village, Jasdan taluka, Rajkot district in Gujarat, was furiously attacked with sticks and other lethal weapons by a group of high-caste persons near the local Ramdev Temple on May 24, 2014, while he was returning from the local milk dairy. Parmar is seen here taking treatment in the Rajkot Civil Hospital. According to Manjula Pradeep of the Navsarjan Trust, a Dalit rights group, “The reason for attack is, two years ago, Parmar’s niece lodged FIR against Jayraj, one of those who attacked Parmar, in the local police station. The Rajkot sessions court convicted Jayraj. Enraged by the judgment, the accused, accompanied by other relatives, attacked Parmar on the day of the judgment." The case was under investigation by deputy superintendent of police, SC/ST cell, Rajkot district.

By Our Representative In a major setback to Gujarat's powerful Adani group known to close to Prime Minister designate Narendra Modi, Germany's largest bank, Deutsche Bank AG, has declared it will not finance the “controversial” coal port expansion in Australia near the Great Barrier Reef. The bank said, it was responding to calls from environmental groups and tourism operators. The move comes nearly a fortnight after Australia’s provincial Queensland government approved a proposal to build Australia’s biggest coal mine – Adani’s Carmichael mine in the Galilee Basin.

By Our Representative Criticizing the BJP’s Prime Minister-designate Narendra Modi for his “unapologetic allegiance to the Hindu political right”, in an unusual move, The New York Times (May 20) has editorially advised him “to offer a powerful balancing message by acting promptly to end the neglect of nearly 4,000 Muslim families displaced by the 2002 riots and now living in 86 settlements in Gujarat.” The influential newspaper has said this, quoting a U.S. State Department report, which states that “30 percent of these victims have yet to receive any aid at all.” The editorial is symbolically titled "Modi's Obligation to Justice".

By Our Representative Following top multinational media chain, Huffington Post, questioning the reliability of electronic voting machines (EVMs) for casting votes (click HERE) in India, well-known social activist Shabnam Hashmi has said she resigned from all UPA committees on December 27, 2012, demanding “the removal of EVM machines as they can be used for manipulations in the elections and undermining our democracy.” She added, she had also “blamed that someone within UPA has connived with right-wing forces to make it happen.” She claimed, with the victory of the BJP in Lok Sabha polls, her suspicion has only intensified.

By Venkatesh Nayak* A friend has raised a question about selection committees for the appointment of statutory authorities under various laws that require the Leader of the Opposition (LOP) in the Lok Sabha to be a member. With the Indian National Congress’s (INC) abysmal performance in the recently concluded Lok Sabha elections some sections of the media are floating the theory of “the 10% rule”, i.e., only such leader will be recognised as LOP if his/her party has at least 10% of seats in the Lok Sabha. This is a canard for reasons given at the bottom of this article. But first, the query raised by my friend. Given below is a situation analysis of some laws regarding the appointment of crucial statutory bodies: Central Information Commission: There will not be any problem in the appointment of the Information Commissioners because in the absence of an LOP in the Lok Sabha, the leader of the single largest party in the Opposition will take that place on the selection committee. So the...

By Our Representative One of world's leaders in online news and information delivery, Cable News Network (CNN), has described India’s Prime Minister in waiting Narendra Modi as “a deeply polarizing figure and an unproven commodity on the international stage.” In an analytical article for its CNN’s international edition, titled “Who is Narendra Modi? Meet India's pro-business, Hindu nationalist PM-in-waiting”, Tim Hume and Sumnima Udas quote analysts, experts, bloggers and journalists to predict that Modi’s “arrival in the country's top office will bring a marked change in direction for the world's most populous democracy.”

An EVM tag found by AAP candidate Medha Patkar's workers on roadside in Mumbai, about which she complained to the Election Commission By Our Representative World’s powerful online media chain “Huffington Post”, two days ahead of the Lok Sabha poll results, had said that the electronic voting machines (EVMs) in Indian polls could be easily manipulated. In an authoritative blog by Cleo Paskal, adjunct faculty, Manipal University, India, the HuffPost, as it is popularly called, said EVMs were unsuccessful in several countries of the world, including the Netherlands, Germany, and Ireland, after they were found to manipulate poll results. Interestingly, Paskal said, the exit polls had predicted Narendra Modi would win the polls, and “the only thing that might stand in his way is an electronic voting machine (EVM).”

By Our Representative Influential right-wing British journal, “The Economist”, which opposed Narendra Modi as India’s Prime Minister calling him divisive (click  HERE ), in its new commentary has "offered" certain neo-liberal recipes to the new government in India to take over under Modi for "repairing" the world’s third largest economy. Titled “Kick-starting India: India’s new government must get the economy working again. Here’s how”, the journal (May 17) has said that “investors are excited” with Modi in power, wanting him to take some tough measures. The steps me must take include abolition of “archaic labour laws”, and take steps to ensure that “contracts to let firms buy land” are strictly obeyed.

By Our Representative A high-level American report, “When Justice Becomes the Victim: The Quest for Justice After the 2002 Violence in Gujarat”, released on May 1, has taken strong exception to the “decisions” by a large section of the international community to normalize relationships with BJP’s prime minister candidate Narendra Modi,  even as viewing efforts to promote increased trade between Gujarat and the rest of the world “as signs that the rest of the world has forgotten about Gujarat’s riot victims.”

By Abhishek Kapoor* Would it not make breaking news if Narendra Modi gave a sound bite saying he felt like an outsider in the RSS? That he failed to connect with them intellectually? That he had nothing to do with the Ram temple movement? Well, he did that in this campaign, and we missed it! As journalists and editors, many times our self-absorbed opinion making is self-serving too. So the only point that made news out of British author Andy Marino’s political biography of Modi was his sadness on 2002 riots. Political observers did not bother to look beyond that in the book.

By Venkatesh Nayak* The media has reported the latest judgment of the Supreme Court (Constitution bench of five judges) striking down a provision of the law that governs the functioning of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), India’s premier anti-corruption investigation agency, regarding the procedure for inquiring into allegations of corruption against civil servants of the rank of joint secretary and above. In an Article 32 petition filed by Dr Subramaniam Swamy and the Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL) led by Prashant Bhushan ( photo ), the Supreme Court has struck down the requirement of taking the approval of the Central Vigilance Commission before initiating even an inquiry into complaints of corruption against senior level civil servants. The Issue Several decades ago the Government of India in its wisdom had made it mandatory for the CBI to take the prior approval of the government to conduct a preliminary inquiry into allegations of corruption against officer...

By Nachiketa Desai* Anti-corruption crusader Arvind Kejriwal’s prospects of trouncing Bharatiya Janata Party’s prime ministerial aspirant Narendra Modi in Varanasi brightened further today when leading litterateurs, theatre artistes and academics jointly appealed to the voters to defeat ‘communal fascist’ Modi to save this holy city’s legacy of Sufi saints Kabir, Tulsi and Raidas. The appeal was made at a one-day ‘Anti-communal fascist convention’ held in the premises of Kabir Math from where the fifteenth century weaver-turned-saint had spread the message of Hindu-Muslim unity through his couplets written in the local Bhojpuri dialect.

By Our Representative  One more powerful western media chain has strongly thrown its weight against the BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, who it predicts will win the current Lok Sabha polls. Top online newspaper Huffington Post, with presence in a dozen countries, including the US, UK, France, Japan and Brazil, has compared Modi with Slobodan Milosevic, Yuglosav ultra-nationalist who was president of the country from 1997 to 2000 and was charged with genocide in connection with the wars in Bosnia, Croatia and Kosovo by the International Criminal Tribunal. Milosevic died in 2006 in jail.

By Nachiketa Desai*   The ganging up of forces with money and muscle power has helped polarization of voters on class line that cuts across caste and communal alignments. The battle of the ballots in Varanasi is fast turning into a struggle for survival for the poor, deprived and the oppressed. The battle of Varanasi has become crucial for Narendra Modi whose defeat would shatter Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) dream of seeing him as the prime minister. Hence, the BJP, backed by the organized cadre of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Bajrang Dal, has pulled out all stops – loosening strings of its bottomless money bag to buy support.

By Our Representative High profile annual report of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), prepared by Dr Robert P. George with 10 others, wants While House to begin to “integrate concern for religious freedom into bilat­eral contacts with India, at both the federal and provincial level.” The report, prepared by the top US body, considered “independent federal advisor” which monitors religious freedom “abuses” abroad, has asked the Obama administration to “increase US embassy’s attention to issues of religious freedom and related human rights in India.”

By Our Representative Senior Vadodara-based social activists Rohit Prajapati and Trupti Shah have asked VS Sampath, chief election commissioner of India, to initiate contempt proceedings and additional actions against Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi, who “mocked” the Election Commission's action of registering FIRs against him for violating the model code of conduct and the Representation of People’s Act, 1951 by making a public speech on April 30 in Ahmedabad, when Gujarat went on Lok Sabha polls. Prajapati heads environmental body Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti, and Shah runs Sahiyar, a women’s group.