UPDATE KOODANKULAM -11-member team heading for Idinthakarai detained

SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT, The Hindu Oct 13, 2012

Police suspect links with banned groups

Members of an 11-member ‘fact-finding committee’ heading towards Idinthakarai, the hub of the protests against the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project, were arrested on Friday.

Four of the members were from Tamil Nadu; three, including a woman, were from Cuddapah district in Andhra Pradesh; two from Jharkhand; and one each from Odisha and Delhi.

They are affiliated to some movements and the police suspect they have close contacts with banned groups. Efforts are on to trace their background.

Based on a tip-off that the team members were on their way to Idinthakarai in a bus, the vehicle was intercepted at the Nanguneri toll gate in the morning. The team members were taken to a marriage hall for interrogation, which revealed that they were affiliated to various organisations, including the Anti-Imperialist Movement, Centre for Protection of Civil Liberties, Students Uprising Movement, Anti-Evacuation Movement, Revolutionary Democratic Front and Women’s Uprising Movement.

Since activities of all these organisations are under scanner and the movement of persons linked to these outfits are being monitored by security agencies, they were detained. Moreover, they cannot be allowed to enter a place where prohibitory orders are in place,” said Deputy Superintendent of Police, Valliyoor Sub-Division, N.K. Stanley Jones. Superintendent of Police, Tirunelveli, Vijayendra S. Bidari and Additional Superintendent of Police, K. Mahendran interrogated them in the evening.

The police have registered cases against them under various sections of the IPC. “We’ve also seized some literature from them,” Mr. Jones said.

 

The details of those arrested on 12 October, 2012, as per the list I have at present include:

1. Palani Sami – Anti Imperialist Movement (Karur)
2. Agaraadhi – Podhu Nala Pengal Ezhuchi Iyyakam (Madurai)
3. Kesavan-CPCL Madurai
4. Jagan – Podhu Nala Manavar Ezhuchi Iyyakkam
5. Varalakshmi– Andhra Pradesh student
6. Pradeepa Human rights activists Jharkhand
7. Damodar – PUCL Delhi
8. Priyadarshini – JNU (DSU)

9Aravind Abiyaas from Jharkhand

10 Hameed, a student from Andhra Pradesh
Names of 1  others not known

Crime FIR no 216/2 Sections 143/188/194b/ 353/ 362/ 506 of IPC r/w 7(1) A of CLA Act

——————————-

In a separate but unrelated incident last Saturday, another group of people who had gathered at a private school to discuss plans of setting up a trade union were picked up at the behest of the notorious Q branch, arrested and remanded in Vellore Jail. The police has managed to defeat the bail application on the basis of arguments that the arrested people are from the Maoist party. This incident was not related to Koodankulam, but speaks of a noticeable and disturbing trend in Tamil Nadu.

Total number of people arrested

13 people

Date of arrest: Saturday 6^th October

Names with age of the persons under arrest

Bhaskar ~40

Duraisingavel ~

Palani

Kumaragurubaran 61

(Maniko) G Paneerselvam ~35– Professor ulga tamil arachi niruvanam

Poovi Arasan (salem -28) Sft ware engg

Senthil Kumar

Gurunathan

Murali Mohan (thiruvannamalai)

Suresh Kumar

Rafique

Mugilan (thiruvannamalai)

Ragini –w/o duraisingavel

 

Name of the organization they are part off

Makkal Jananayaga Kudiarasu Katchi (peoples Democratic republic party)

Sections under which they have been arrested

17 (1) of Criminal Law Amendment Act : (unlawful assembly)

Jail location: Vellore prison

Place of arrest: Kundrathur Paavendar Tamilvayi Palli (tamil medium school)

Name of the police station: Kundrathur police station

history of the event

The members of the party had assembled to discuss about setting up and registering trade union on a industry basis. They assembled about 10am. Discussion were happening. Permission had been sought from the school authorities (Palani’s daughters are studying in the school and he had sought permission). evening around 5:30 pm Q branch police along with local police numbering 20 entere dthe premises and started to enquire about them. They wanted to know the reason for the meeting and to know about the organization and collected the personal details of the people present. By this time Bhaskar had contacted a few advoctes but he was not sure they would be arrested. They continued with to the enquiry even upto 9:30pm and then the police arrested them.

The arrest was done by the kundrathur police on the complaint of Q branch SI Mohan. The complainant maintains that the persons were gathered in the school and conducting a meeting in a closed room in which the lights had been put off. ————

police account

The group had no permission. The members ar e part of the banned maoist party. SOme of th emembers have been convicted or have charges under POTA.

they had unlawfully assembled (in the sense they did not get any permission from the police) and were secretly discussing. (this part is unclear as adv Natarajan was not too clear)

 

Bail moved

Bail was moved on Monday (8^th) at the Magistrate Court in Sriperumbudur. the case came up for hearing on Wednesday (10^th )where the judge adjourned the case to Friday (12^th) as the PP sought time to file the counter by the police and state.

Status of bail application

On Friday (12^th) the bail was dismissed as the judge accepted the PP’s argument that they were known maoists with previous charges and the police need time to investigate.

 

DETAILS GATHERED BY OTHER FRIENDS FROM ADV. NATARAJ WHOSE HANDLING THE BAIL PROCESS

 

Related articles

• Koodankulam Update: 9 October, 2012 (kractivist.wordpress.com)
• IMMEDIATE RELEASE- CPI(ML) General Secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya Arrested while Entering Koodankulam (kractivist.wordpress.com)
• “Undeclared Emergency in Idinthakarai” (thehindu.com)

Narendra Modi still to reply RTI activists

English: Narendra Modi, Chief Minister of Gujarat, India, speaks during the welcome lunch at the World Economic Forum’s India Economic Summit 2008 in New Delhi (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

 

 

Vadodara: Two RTI activists have written a letter to Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, saying details of travel expenses incurred by him and others in attending job fairs organised by the government have not been provided to them despite seeking the information six months ago.

 

The activists, Rohit Prajapati and Amrish Brambhatt, on Friday said they filed an RTI application on April 14, 2012, seeking details about the expenses incurred by the Chief Minister, Ministers and other government officials who visited different venues during ‘Vivekanand Youth Employment Week’.

 

According to them, during the employment week in January, 489 job fairs were held in different parts of Gujarat and offer letters provided to 65,000 youths. “Till today we have not received information about travelling expenses incurred by you (the Chief Minister), Ministers, MLAs, MPs and others officials who visited these fairs,” they said in the letter written on Friday.

 

The activists said their RTI application was forwarded to all districts, but the authorities concerned had not yet provided the details sought by them. “It is obvious that some department must have incurred the expenses or the expenses would have been sponsored by somebody. You (Modi) should provide us information about the expenditure incurred by your departments or the name of the sponsor,” they said. Prajapati and Brambhatt said they expected a positive response from Modi.

 

Related articles

 

• RTI activist targets Narendra Modi over foreign travel, seeks information (kractivist.wordpress.com)
• In Narendra Modi’s good-governance regime, four villagers expose mega housing scam using #RTI (kractivist.wordpress.com)
• Letter to Gujarat CM #Narendramodi on #SoniaGandhi #mustread (kractivist.wordpress.com)
• Narendra Modi’s travelling cost during ’07 mahila sammelans is zero! #Wtfnews (kractivist.wordpress.com)

 

30,000 passport applications pending- #UID #Aadhaar

30,000 passport applications pending

The HinduRegional Passport Officer Srikar Reddy (centre) at interaction meet at FAPCCI in Hyderabad on Thursday. Photo: G. Krishnaswamy
The Hindu

Delay in police verification creating backlog, says RPO

Close to 30,000 passport applications are pending with the passport office for want of police clearance. Delay in police verification is a major factor leading to pendency in issue of passports, Regional Passport Officer (RPO) K. Srikar Reddy said here on Thursday.

Participating in an interactive meeting organised by Federation of Andhra Pradesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FAPCCI), he said police units in Krishna, Karimnagar, and Anantapur districts and Cyberabad commissionerate were completing the verification process within the stipulated time of three weeks. “We hope the policemen in other districts would also complete the process in three weeks and enable us to issue passports at the earliest,” he said.

The RPO had a meeting with the Intelligence Department chief on the issue and the latter had asked all the Superintendents of Police to expedite the process. Following these instructions, more than 30,000 applications were cleared, but pendency still stood at 30,000 more applications, he added. Another reason for the delay in issue was furnishing of incomplete details in the applications. Proposals were also sent to the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) to accept Aadhaar cards as identity and residence proof. “It is in final stages of approval,” he said. In case pages in a passport get exhausted, passport holders can apply for another passport by submitting proof of urgency and get the passport on the same day. They can also apply under Tatkal scheme to get the passport within three days.

The Ministry also approved setting up of PSKs at Karimnagar and Bhimavaram shortly.

Related articles

• India- Officials suspect accuracy of census data ? #WTFnews #aadhaar #Nandanilekani (kractivist.wordpress.com)
• Discrepancies in issue of Aadhaar cards (thehindu.com)

 

GOP Politician’s Outrageous Father-to-Son Lesson: Women “Rape So Easy” #wtfnews

Wisconsin rep. endorsed by Paul Ryan blames women for being so darn rape-able.

October 11, 2012  |

Clearly it’s not as simple as “no means no.”

A Wisconsin freshman representative is watching his re-election chances plummet as his comments that “some women rape easy” begin to circulate in the media, fueling another round of outrage over the GOP’s seeming blatant ignorance about women’s health and safety.

State Rep. Roger Rivard (R-Rice Lake) made the statement last December, explaining that as a young boy his father had scared him into pre-marital sex by telling him that “some women rape easy,” which is apparently bro-talk for the widespread phenomenon of women consenting to sex at night only to turn around the next morning and cry rape. The comments are drawing attention now, almost ten months later, because Rivard is in a tight race against Democratic challenger Stephen Smith over the state representative seat and because Rivard has been endorsed by GOP Vice Presidential candidate Paul Ryan.

Rivard has complained that his comments were taken out of context since they were first published in a local town newspaper, The Chetek Alert, after the representative commented on the case of a high school senior being charged with sexual assault for having sex with a girl under 18, which is the legal age for consent in Wisconsin.

Rivard attempted to clarify his words to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel yesterday:

“[My father] also told me one thing, ‘If you do (have premarital sex), just remember, consensual sex can turn into rape in an awful hurry,’ ” Rivard said. “Because all of a sudden a young lady gets pregnant and the parents are madder than a wet hen and she’s not going to say, ‘Oh, yeah, I was part of the program.’ All that she has to say or the parents have to say is it was rape because she’s underage. And he just said, ‘Remember, Roger, if you go down that road, some girls,’ he said, ‘they rape so easy.’

“What the whole genesis of it was, it was advice to me, telling me, ‘If you’re going to go down that road, you may have consensual sex that night and then the next morning it may be rape.’ So the way he said it was, ‘Just remember, Roger, some girls, they rape so easy. It may be rape the next morning.’

“So it’s been kind of taken out of context.”

Doesn’t sound like it’s been taken out of context at all. The explicit point of his words is that women can’t be trusted (with sex, but really why with the vote either?) and that rape is not a real form of violence but actually just a false claim that could ensnare any God-fearing, unsuspecting young man who momentarily falls victim to the Sirens’ cries.

Rivard’s supporter Paul Ryan was able to avoid uttering one of these women-hating, rape-denying slips last night during the vice presidential debate. But other members of the GOP, most notoriously Todd Akin, have been recently caught issuing similar statements, such as the idea that no “legitimate rape” can result in pregnancy because a woman’s body has a way of dealing with these types of things. These comments sparked outrage not only for being offensive, but also for betraying a clear lack of knowledge about the basic anatomy of women’s bodies–a scary ignorance for a lawmaker in an era when medical care is increasingly regulated and decided by the government.

Both these comments also display a clear inability to talk about sexual consent in a meaningful way. How else, after all, could a fun romp in the sack turn into one of the most psychologically and physically damaging experiences a woman can have a mere eight hours later? The confusion and struggle to discuss consent is unsurprising, given the fact that adolescent sexual education is nearly non-existent. Changing that won’t be possible until we have lawmakers who are willing to support the idea that teenagers (who will soon grow into adults) should be informed about not only how sex biologically works, but how it can be navigated in a way that is physically and emotionally consensual.

Since that’s looking like it may be a long-time coming in this political climate, we can at least thank Akin for assuring us that none of the next generation’s ignorance-fueled rapes will result in any babies.

 

Laura Gottesdiener is a freelance journalist and activist in New York City.