Press Release – Unending Spiral of Violence: Darbha

PEOPLE’S UNION FOR DEMOCRATIC RIGHTS

PRESS RELEASE

31^st May 2013

Unending Spiral of Violence: Darbha

The People’s Union for Democratic Rights (PUDR) notes with concern the sad loss of 30 lives in the Maoist attack on the “Parivartan Rally” of Congress Party on 25 May 2013. This is the latest in the series of killings, big and small, in the ongoing undeclared war that the Indian government is waging against our own people. Many of the victims of this war are poor adivasis killed in operations by the security forces, that the government assiduously attempts to hide from the public at large. But, as in the present instance, ruling party functionaries, security forces personnel and Maoist cadres have also lost their lives.

Since 2005, the PUDR and a number of civil liberties organizations have been consistently alerting the public to this escalating war against the poorest of our citizens. Between May 2012 and May 2013 there has been a six to eight times increase in the number of security forces operations being carried out in the Bastar division of Chhattisgarh. In every district no less than 10-15 operations were already being carried out each month. These are being conducted away from the prying eye of the media and civil liberties activists and civilian access to these areas is severely curtailed. On 17 May, ten days before the attack on Congress leaders, nine persons including three children were killed by the security forces in the village of Ehadesmeta.

While PUDR sees the killing of two people who were taken into custody in this instance as an act that cannot be justified and against the rules of war, there is a need to speak out about the role of parties such as Congress and BJP in launching Salwa Judum, which was designed to terrorise the adivasis of Bastar. Congress leaders like Mahendra Karma, the BJP led Chhattisgarh government and the UPA government patronized this murderous enterprise until it was declared illegal by the Supreme Court of India. While Salwa Judum may have formally ended, the elements which comprised the SJ including its leaders and handlers in the security establishment were either incorporated in the ongoing operations as regular forces or some of them chose to switch from being ‘hunters’ to ‘running with the hares’ with impending state assembly elections due in November. In any case, every attempt to prosecute those guilty of the heinous crimes had been frustrated by the governments in power. So the carnage that took place on 26 May was something, unfortunately, waiting to happen.

The governments have plainly connected the continuation of the ongoing war with the prospects of growth in national income. None other than Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh declared Maoists to be the single biggest internal security threat in 2006. Speaking to IPS probationers on 24^th December 2010, he also explained the reason for the war: “Naxalism today afflicts the Central India parts where the bulk of India’s mineral wealth lies and if we don’t control Naxalism we have to say goodbye to our country’s ambitions to sustain growth rate of 10-11 per cent per annum.”

All doubts were laid to rest when government actions confirmed the verbal declarations. In Saranda forest of Jharkhand, once the Maoists were forced to pull back, the Forest Advisory Committee of the Ministry of Environment and Forests began clearing proposals of mining corporations to take over forests for non-forest use. It led Minister for Rural Development, Jairam Ramesh, to complain on 7 February 2013 that “I have been at great pains to counter Maoist propaganda that the Saranda Development Project is a ploy to benefit private mining interests. This Forest Advisory Committee decision is a huge setback and very retrograde” (8 February 2013, Indian Express, Delhi). The Union Tribal Affairs Minister Kishore Chandra Deo complained to Hindustan Times (17 May 2013) that “my permission [is] not required nor my opinion is sought in matters relating to tribals. My voice goes unheard”.

On the other hand, legislations and constitutional provisions meant to safeguard tribals are being thrown to the winds. The fate of the Forest Rights Act (FRA), the showpiece legislation of UPA-I, ostensibly promulgated for empowering forest dwellers, is a case in point. Quite apart from its poor implementation, the core issue of Gram Sabha’s “consent” for non-tribal use of tribal land has been diluted not just in the name of “linear projects”, but in the Congress-ruled Andhra Pradesh the government has concluded that under the FRA, Gram Sabha consent is required only to permit mining of minor minerals whereas major minerals such as bauxite and iron ore etc are outside their jurisdiction. Supreme Court’s latest order on Niyamgiri Hills narrows down the jurisdiction of Gram Sabhas by reducing and restricting the definition of impacted area to a radius of ten kilometers, when it is a known fact that livelihood and lives are affected across a much larger area.

It is this continued attack on lives and livelihood of people, threat of displacement from forest areas, dilution of FRA, PESA and complete indifference to Sixth Schedule compounded by the increasing restrictions on public protests, arbitrary laws to prosecute those who oppose their dispossession and bans on political opinion that is responsible for the civil unrest that pervades our society. It is this government that places the requirements of Foreign Direct Investment above the needs of our own people, and which attempts to ram down this “development model” with the barrel of a gun, that is at fault.

As the war is being scaled up it is also turning ugly. PUDR, therefore, urges all people to bring pressure on the ruling parties at the Centre and the nine state governments currently carrying out this war, to de-escalate the militarisation of this region and show a commitment towards dialogue. We hope that the deaths of 30 persons in the present instance and of hundreds of people in the past eight years are sufficient reason for people to recognize the absurdity of this war.

In the meantime, we ask the Government of India to shed its policy of deniability and accept that it is engaged in an internal war. And we ask both sides to abide by the rules that govern war by declaring its commitment to common article 3 of Geneva Convention and Protocol II, which applies to non-international armed conflict.

Asish Gupta and D. Manjit

(Secretaries)

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Indian Tribal Women Rush to a Champion’s Defense #Womenrights

By Swapna Majumdar

WeNews correspondent

Friday, May 31, 2013

Tribal women in India are mobilizing behind a leading maternal-health advocate. Supporters say the case against Madhuri Krishnaswamy was concocted to stop her from flagging rights violations that led to 25 maternal deaths in nine months in one impoverished district.

Tribal women protesting Madhuri Krishnaswamy’s arrest.

Credit: Jagrit Adivasi Dalit Sangathan (JADS).

NEW DELHI, India (WOMENSENEWS)–The May 30 release of Madhuri Krishnaswamy, a relentless campaigner for better maternal health for marginalized tribal women in Barwani, one of the most impoverished districts in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, has brought temporary peace in the district.

Angry protestors who had been gathering in Barwani included about 2,000 tribal women from different parts of India, estimates Jagrit Adivasi Dalit Sangathan, the local advocacy group that Krishnaswamy heads.

Protesters converged on Barwani, ready to face arrest unless police charges against Krishnaswamy, based on the complaint by a Barwani health official, are withdrawn.

The May 16 jailing and arrest of Krishnaswamy on charges of — among things — obstructing a public official, have drawn outcry from rights groups and activists across the country. Demonstrators have been concentrated in Barwani, but some civil society groups have also met with senior health officials at the federal health ministry in Delhi to drum up support for Krishnaswamy.

More demonstrations, public rallies and litigation strategies to hold Madhya Pradesh government officials accountable for violations of women’s rights to life, health and non-discrimination are being pursued to pressure the administration to drop the charges.

The state government turned a blind eye to the health violations that Krishnaswamy was flagging and made up a false case to muzzle her, said Jashodhara Dasgupta of the National Alliance for Maternal Health and Human Rights, a coalition of 17 health advocacies, which has supported Krishnaswamy’s work.

Dasgupta, a member of the alliance, which is headquartered in New Delhi, told Women’s eNews that the arrest was meant to conceal the administration’s failure to implement various government programs for marginalized women.

No Comment from Local Government

The Barwani administration has not commented on the issue. The police filed a closure report in the case for lack of evidence in April. But after testimony by a Barwani health official the court summoned Krishnaswamy and sent her to prison after she refused to seek bail.

The false nature of the case was clear when some of the charges that led to her arrest included “rioting armed with deadly weapons,” said Ajay Lal, a program officer for Support for Advocacy and Training to Health Initiatives, a community health advocacy based in Pune, Maharashtra, that has been working with Krishnaswamy in Barwani.

“Krishnaswamy’s arrest is a blatant act of state reprisal against an activist who has repeatedly drawn attention to the health violations,” Lal said in a phone interview. Lal said poor maternal care in government hospitals was leading to deaths of poor tribal women.

Jagrit Adivasi Dalit Sangathan, the nongovernmental organization headed by Krishnaswamy, has staged persistent protests against the poor health services in the largely tribal area of Barwani for the past 14 years.

Barwani has the second-lowest Human Development Index among the 50 districts in the state, according to the Madhya Pradesh Human Development Report 2007. Using a 2003 government sampling, this report put the maternal mortality rate for the district at 905 deaths per 100,000 live births compared to the state’s already-high figure of 379 per 100,000 live births.

Under Millennium Development Goal No. 5 India has pledged to reduce its maternal mortality ratio by three quarters before 2015 to 109 deaths for every 100,000 live births, far lower than the current figure of 212. By comparison, the United States, a laggard among industrialized countries, has a national average maternal mortality rate of 21 per 100,000 live births.

Tribal Women Denied Care

Supporters say Krishnaswamy’s arrest is linked to the 2008 case of Baniya Bai, a tribal woman living in Barwani district.

When the nine-month pregnant Baniya Bai reached the nearest government health center after travelling about nine miles by bullock cart from her village, a local health officer demanded a $2 bribe before allowing her to be attended. When family members couldn’t pay, she was dismissed from the center and wound up giving birth outside the facility, on the street, according to Krishnaswamy’s advocacy group.

Baniya Bai and her child survived.

Vypari Bai, a resident of another village in the same district, did not. Before dying she went through a terrifying 27 hours of labor pain as she was shunted by health officials from one government health facility to another in search of medical attention.

Krishnaswamy documented both cases in a court petition she filed in 2011 that flagged health-rights violations that led to 25 maternal deaths in Barwani government health facilities during a nine-month period of 2010.

“Tribal women are still dying from pregnancy-related causes because of official neglect and apathy,” saidHarsing Jamre, chief program coordinator of Jagrit Adivasi Dalit Sangathan, in a phone interview. “Are the lives of tribal women less valuable? No action has been taken against such health officials. But our organization head (Krishnaswamy) raises her voice against this injustice, action is taken against her.”

According to the Human Rights Law Network, a Delhi-based collective of lawyers and social activists that investigated the Barwani maternal deaths, 21 of the 25 deaths from April to November 2010 in the district were women from the marginalized caste tribal group known as Scheduled Tribes, which are eligible for special benefits including free healthcare.

Sixty seven percent of people in Barwani belong to Scheduled Tribes.

Fatal Factors for Tribal Women

Krishnaswamy’s supporters say her cause and her own mistreatment show how government corruption, coupled with caste and gender discrimination are fatal for tribal women.

Disturbing correlations between social inequities and access to healthcare were identified in 2011 by health advocacies investigating maternal deaths and denial of health care in Barwani.

The report–by Sama, CommonHealth and Jan Swasthya Abhiyan — found that marginalized groups, in general, had trouble finding justice and tribal women were doubly disadvantaged by gender power hierarchy and caste.

Earlier this year, on Jan. 27, the Indore bench of the Madhya Pradesh High Court directed the state government to improve its healthcare manpower and infrastructure. The order stemmed from a public-interest suit filed by Krishnaswamy’s group and the Human Rights Law Network that documented maternal deaths of tribal women caused by negligence and denial of health care.

Activists working in Barwani say that better infrastructure and more clinicians must also be accompanied by a more humane attitude. Doctors rarely treat marginalized tribal women with empathy, they say, and long wait for service can be fatal for both the pregnant mother and child.

Swapna Majumdar is based in New Delhi and writes on gender, development and politics.

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#India -Police action traumatised anti-dam tribals in MP #Stateoppression #humanrights

Chaukhand village, Khargone (MP), May 30, 2013

Pheroze L. Vincent

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  The Hindu Villagers staging indefinite dharna at Kharak Dam at Chaukhand village in Khargone district in Madhya Pradesh on Thursday demanding proper compensation. Photo: A.M. Faruqui
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  The Hindu Villagers including children staging indefinite dharna at Kharak Dam at Chaukhand village in Khargone disstrict in Madhya Pradesh on Thursday, demanding proper compensation. Photo: A.M. Faruqui.
• 
  The Hindu Villagers staging indefinite dharna at Kharak Dam at Chaukhand village in Khargone disstrict in Madhya Pradesh on Thursday, demanding proper compensation. Photo: A.M.Faruqui

Sisters Kalibai and Phulbai are in a state of shock after they were caned by the police on May 25. Aged 8 and 6, they rushed towards their father Tudpiabai Gangaram on seeing him being caned by the police during a protest against the Kharak Reservoir being built beside their village.

“I said don’t hit my father. My father asked us to run away. Before we could run the policeman hit us also,” said Kali, struggling to talk with her swollen mouth. Phul asked her to open her mouth. “Her tooth broke as the cane hit her mouth,” she said pointing at a missing tooth.

Chaukhand has been resisting the construction of the dam, a minor irrigation project in Khargone and Barwani districts, roughly 350 km south west of Bhopal. Inhabited by the Barela tribe, the village grows wheat, jowar, soya, groundnuts and other traditional millets, beside River Kharak. Most residents do not have documents for the land they cultivate. The reservoir will submerge parts of seven villages.

Work on the project, which had started less than a year ago, has stopped for the last two months due to protests by locals. There are daily dharnas under the village peepul tree demanding a comprehensive rehabilitation policy, before the dam comes up.

“We had started work only on the 55 hectares for which claims were settled at roughly Rs. 3 lakhs per acre according to the collector’s guidelines. The problem is with those who don’t have documents. The principal secretary has decided to give them a relief amount of Rs. 4 lakhs per hectare. On Saturday we went to talk with the villagers when the situation deteriorated,” said Executive Engineer SS Raghuvanshi of the Water Resources Department.

Villagers narrated a different story. “At 10.30 a.m. we were on dharna as usual when four police vans came with around 150 male and female officers. The Sub Divisional Magistrate Jitendra Singh Chouhan was in front. They formed a line. We went to the SDM and asked when we will get compensation. He said that everyone with documents will get compensation but first we must clear the area,” said Shivram Kanase an activist of the Jagrit Adivasi Dalit Sangathan (JADS) which works in the area.

The villagers asked them to pay the compensation before starting work. Police then forcibly evicted them from the site. “They chased me and snatched my child from my arms and threw him on the ground. That policeman’s breathe smelt of liquor. He beat me with his cane,” said Samranabai, a local resident.

Collector Navneet Kothari is on leave and Superintendent of Police R. P. Singh refused to answer queries. He said, “You do your job. If I say there was no lathi charge, will you believe me?”

Another lady named Banchibai Ningole, with an infant at her breast, was arrested from her house, said villagers. Totally seven men and twenty women are in judicial custody. They were denied bail on Wednesday. The police have told the court that they are on the look out for others and that if released, the 27 would rejoin the protests.

“I asked the SDM why his men were beating women and children. He said that we were stopping government work and we would be locked up. Inspector T. C. Usre caught my hand and hit me. The women constables didn’t do anything. Maybe they felt bad for us,” said Gyanibai Jadav.

SDM Chouhan denied the occurrence of a lathi charge. “Villagers attacked the workers at the site. I told them that we won’t tolerate violence. We can convey their objections to the government. Police only removed them from the machines. There was no lathi charge,” he told The Hindu.

Many men and women showed the cane scars on their backs and legs. Four children with bruises claimed they had either been hit or had fallen while running from the police. The counsel for the arrested, C. K. Pathak said that he wasn’t pressing charges on the police as he first wants his clients to be released.

Bail was denied on a day when CM Shivraj Chauhan visited the district to conduct a mass marriage. On May 28 the government announced a Rs. 212 crore package for oustees of the Omkareshwar Dam, which will be given on condition that they vacate their homes by July 15. The evictees in neighbouring Khandwa had gained international prominence when they went on jal satyagraha by indefinitely immersing sitting in the River Narmada last year.

Here in Chaukhand, an uneasy peace prevails with villagers unsure of whose lands will be occupied and how much money they will get. Many fields have already been filled with rocks by the construction contractors. They are also under pressure from panchayat leaders not to obstruct the construction. Both the dharna continues and construction work has stopped.

Villager Sakaram accompanied this reporter on the way out of the village, which is connected to Dhulkot Panchayat by a long un-metallled road filled with stones. Ambulances don’t come here, he said, and many women have complicated pregnancies due to the journey on bullock cart to the hospital.

On Thurday a Barwani court granted bail to JADS leader Madhuri Krishnaswamy, who was arrested a fortnight back for a 2008 case of rioting. Ms. Krishnaswamy took up the case of a tribal woman giving birth on the street after being evicted from a primary health centre. The suspended pharmacist had filed the case on her.

“Last time we all voted for BJP as they promised us land pattas. This time we are going to meet (Congress state president) Kantilal Bhuria ji when he visits Khargone of June 4,” Mr. Sakaram added. He goes to public meetings of both the Congress and the BJP. “One day they will listen to us,” he explained.

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#India Surfers- Soon govt will know what you surfed in 24 hrs #WTFnews

Be warned: Soon govt will know what you surfed yesterday

by FP Editors May 25, 2013

A report in BusinessLine today informs us that the government wants to keep track of where you go on your internet travels, and is planning to make it compulsory for telecom and internet service providers (ISPs) to maintain detailed records of your surfing habits and proclivities.

An insecure state machinery that regularly snoops on its people is bad enough; but a police state greased by corruption and zero accountability means the privacy of ordinary citizens will be sacrificed in the cause of the powerful. Reuters

Currently, mobile companies have to keep voice call data records, but in future they may have to do so even with data traffic.

An Internet Protocol Detail Record (IPDR) system, offered by may companies selling telecom gear, enables ISPs to track and store details of our net usage. If the telecom department succeeds in forcing them to keep records of everyone’s data usage patterns without putting in place a strong privacy law, anyone with access to these records can blackmail individuals.

The fact is security agencies already have the right to ask telcos and ISPs to intercept the data of people they suspect of wrongdoing. Forcing them to maintain detailed records of data usage patterns means privacy risks will soar since information will be available on anyone and everyone.

Consider the dangers:

When usage data is stored for long periods of time, every telco knows it is there and could use it to access privileged information.

When paying bribes comes so easily, the possibility that such data may be sold to criminals or blackmailers for cash is high. Once data leaks, there may be no way to trace it back to who passed the information on.

Governments can always use this information against political rivals.

It is worth recalling that the Niira Radia tapes, though legitimately tapped by the income-tax department, were leaked to the media. Even though this helped us discover the 2G scam, the fact is nobody has been held accountable for the illegal leaks in this case — even with the Supreme Court hearing the matter.

An insecure state machinery that regularly snoops on its people is bad enough; but a police state greased by corruption and zero accountability means the privacy of ordinary citizens will be sacrificed in the cause of the powerful.

 

Greenpeace slams Maharashtra for diverting water

MUMBAI, May 31, 2013

The Hindu

Despite the drought in Maharashtra, the State government diverted water to thermal power plants in scarcity regions, said Greenpeace on Thursday. Releasing data on water diversions from dams, Jai Krishna, a Greenpeace campaigner, said that an analysis of water consumption by coal-fired thermal power plants during the worst drought in 40 years has exposed instances of wrong prioritisation.

Four State-owned power plants — Bhusawal in Jalgaon district, Parli in Beed district, Paras in Akola, and one in Nasik with an installed capacity of 3,680 MW — are in drought-affected districts. While the Parli plant has been shut from February 15 this year, the government had approved in December 2012 a provision of 5,000 million litres of water from the Mudgal barrage in Parbhani, which had reported zero storage in December 2012, said Mr. Krishna.

The Bhusawal and Paras thermal plants used 10,350 million litres from January to March 2013.

Two reservoirs in the region, Jayakwadi and Majalgaon, were nearing dead storage levels. While the Bhusawal plant gets water from Hatnur dam, Paras is supplied water from private barrages on the Mun river. Eight talukas in Jalgaon suffer acute water scarcity and even Jalgaon city has no water as two dams are completely dry, Greenpeace said.

In view of acute scarcity of water, the government resolved in January that water from big, small and medium projects would only be used for drinking purposes.

However, the government proposed power plants with a capacity of 13,120 MW in these drought-affected areas and water for them was granted by a high-powered committee. In Vidarbha too, power plants with a capacity of 55,000 MW have been proposed. Greenpeace listed eight plants with a total capacity of 9,440 MW in water-scarce districts. Water supply from dams had been approved for these plants.

Mr. Krishna said that to generate one MW of coal-based power, 4,000 to 5,000 litres of water are needed per hour.

Greenpeace has called for a cumulative water impact assessment in the river basins, halt to diversion of water, and an energy policy which is less water-intensive.

“No wastage”

However, a spokesperson for Mahagenco, the State’s power-producing utility, clarified that water for drinking was the first priority, and all seven of its power plants had their own recycling plants and did not waste water.

In Parli, the situation is such that there cannot be any more water supply from other sources.

He also said power too was essential in the State and the utility could not shut down plants across the board.

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Protest by Omkeshwar Dam affected Oustees

ओम्कारेश्वर बांध : घोघलगाँव में प्रभावितों की सभा और आन्दोलन की घोषणा

Posted by संघर्ष संवाद on शुक्रवार, मई 31, 2013

ओम्कारेश्वर परियोजना प्रभावित गांव घोघलगाँव में 30 मई को हजारों प्रभावितों ने रैली निकालकर आमसभा की. सभा में प्रभावितों हाल ही में राज्य सरकार द्वारा ओम्कारेश्वर प्रभावितों के लिए 212 करोड़ के पुनर्वास पैकज को विस्थापितों के संघर्ष की जीत बताते हुए भूमिहीन प्रभावितों को 2.5 लाख रूपये देने का स्वागत किया. प्रभावितों ने सरकार की किसानो को 2 लाख रूपये प्रति एकड़ देने को पुनर्वास नीति का उल्लंघन बताते हुए उसे अस्वीकार कर दिया. सभा में इंदिरा सागर, महेश्वर आदि बांधों के प्रतिनिधि भी शामिल हुए और सभी ने आगामी 18 जून से भोपाल में हजारों की संख्या में डेरा डालने की घोषणा की.

गत वर्ष के जल सत्याग्रह के लिए प्रसिद्ध ग्राम घोघलगाँव में हजारों प्रभावितों ने गाँव में रैली निकली और सत्याग्रह स्थल पर माँ नर्मदा की अर्चना की. सभी प्रभावितों में जश्न का माहौल था. रैली के बाद सत्याग्रह स्थल पर आमसभा का आयोजन किया गया. सभा को संबोधित करते हुए नर्मदा आन्दोलन के वरिष्ठ कार्यकर्ता श्री आलोक अग्रवाल ने कहा कि सरकार की घोषणा ओम्कारेश्वर बांध प्रभावितों के 7 साल के संघर्ष की जीत है पर यह पूरी नहीं आंशिक जीत है. भूमिहीनों के बारे में हमारी मांग पूरी तरह स्वीकार कर ली गयी है पर किसानो को पुनर्वास नीति के अनुसार न्यूनतम 5 एकड़ जमीन खरीदने के लिए सरकार ने सहायता नहीं देकर न सिर्फ पुनर्वास नीति बल्कि सर्वोच्च न्यायालय के आदेश का भी उल्लंघन किया है. सरकार द्वारा घोषित राशि से किसान किसी भी हालत में जमीन नहीं खरीद सकता है. उन्होंने इस आंशिक जीत के लिए देश- दुनिया से मिले समर्थन और मिडिया द्वारा संवेदना पूर्वक विस्थापितों की आवाज उठाने के लिए धन्यवाद् दिया.

आन्दोलन की प्रमुख कार्यकर्ता सुश्री चित्तरूपा पालित ने कहा सबसे गरीब को सबसे पहले सहायता मिलने से पुरे क्षेत्र में ख़ुशी है. जिस संकल्प और विश्वास से हमने अभी तक अपनी लड़ाई को इस मुकाम तक लाया है उसी के साथ हम अपने जमीन के अधिकार भी लेकर रहेंगे. उन्होंने मांग की कि सरकार भूमिहीनों को बसने के लिए न्यूनतम 6 माह का समय दे.ओम्कारेश्वर बांध प्रभावित श्री मंसाराम ग्राम एखंड, श्री केसरसिंह ग्राम टोकी, सुश्री सकुबाई ग्राम कामनखेड़ा, सुश्री नीलाबाई ग्राम घोघलगाँव ने भूमिहीनों की घोषणा का स्वागत करते हुए किसानो के लिए हुई घोषणा को नकार दिया और घोषणा की कि उनके न्यूनतम 5 एकड़ सिंचित जमीन के अधिकार के लिए वो संघर्ष तेज करेंगे.

इंदिरा सागर परियोजना प्रभावित हरदा जिले के श्री रामविलास राठौर, खंडवा जिले के श्री राजेंद्र पटेल, देवास जिले से श्री ललित आदि ने कहा की इंदिरा सागर बांध के प्रभावितों को भी उनके पुनर्वास के अधिकार न देकर पूरी तरह उजाड़ दिया गया है और आगामी 18 जून से भोपाल में होने वाले “जीवन अधिकार सत्याग्रह में इंदिरा सागर प्रभावित हजारों की संख्या में शामिल होंगे.
महेश्वर परियोजना प्रभावित श्री राधेश्याम भाई और श्री कैलाश पाटीदार ने कहा कि गत 16 साल की लड़ाई के कारण ही महेश्वर बांध प्रभावित उजड़ने से बचे हुए हैं और महेश्वर परियोजनाकर्ता 15% भी पुनर्वास नहीं कर पाया है. उन्होंने घोषणा की कि भोपाल सत्याग्रह में महेश्वर बांध प्रभावित भी हजारों की संख्या में शामिल होंगे.

भोपाल के जीवन अधिकार सत्याग्रह में 18 जून को पूरी ताकत के साथ पहुंचे के संकल्प के साथ सभा का समापन हुआ. भोपाल में ओम्कारेश्वर, इंदिरा सागर, महेश्वर, मान और अपर बेदा बांध के हजारों प्रभावित 18 जून से 22 जून तक 5 दिन का सत्याग्रह व् उपवास करेंगे.

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International shooter Varsha Tomar’s husband held for dowry harassment #Vaw

Suraj Chaudhary, husband of international shooter Varsha Tomar, was arrested here for dowry harassment, police said Thursday

May 31, 2013

GURGAON

IANS

He was presented in the court of Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate (ACJM) Rajesh Sharma.

He was sent to police custody for one day.

“We are interrogating accused for recovery of jewellry and other valuables given at the time of marriage by victim’s parents,” investigation officer Balwan Singh Gulia told IANS.

A case of dowry harassment, criminal intimidation and criminal breach of trust was registered against Tomar’s husband, Suraj Chaudhary and her mother-in-law, Tushtata Chaudhary, was registered Wednesday at DLF City Phase I police station.

Tomar, won several gold and silver medals in national and international shooting events, said in her complaint that she was not allowed to go for practice sessions

Tomar married Chaudhary, a native of Uttar Pradesh and a Noida-based lawyer, in December 2011.

At the time of marriage, the first information report FIR said, Tomar’s in-laws promised her that she could pursue her shooting career but they stopped her from stepping out of the house.

Suraj lives with his brother in Noida and his accused mother is living at their ancestral village in Shyamli district of Uttar Pradesh.

According to police, complainant Varsha Tomar is living in Value Estate here on Gurgaon-Faridabad road.

 

#India- Tribal Affairs Minister cautions against deploying Army to tackle Maoist problem

New Delhi, May 31, 2013

PTI

 Tribal Affairs Minister V. Kishore Chandra Deo on Thursday dubbed anti-Maoist militia Salwa Judum as a “sinful strategy,” bringing to the fore apparent differences in the Congress over the approach to Maoists who last week wiped out party leadership in Chhattisgarh in a deadly attack.

Mr. Deo warned that the nation would witness “worse consequences” if the Naxalite issue was treated as a mere law and order problem, just days after Union Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh termed the Maoists as “terrorists” after the May 25 bloodbath.

The people “worst affected” by the Salwa Judum, founded by Mahendra Karma, Congress leader who was killed in the attack, were innocent tribals, who were “sandwiched” between security forces and Maoists and “this shadow is still chasing us,” the Minister said.

Talking to PTI, Mr. Deo, himself a tribal, cautioned against deploying Army to counter the Naxals.

“Air power and military are meant to fight the enemy and not your own citizens…. How do you differentiate a Maoist? …It will create a civil war-like situation,” he said insisting that the Naxal issue was basically a socio-economic problem.

Asked whether the Salwa Judum was a faulty or a failed strategy, he remarked it was a “sinful” strategy.

When P. Chidambaram was Home Minister, senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh opposed any strategy treating the Naxal problem as a law and order issue.

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Press Release – Statement on the unprecedented detention of CDRO team by police

Sanhati

May 29, 2013

We strongly condemn the absolutely arbitrary and unprecedented action of the Jharkhand police administration in detaining eight members of a CDRO (Coordination of Democratic Rights Organizations) fact-finding team while they were addressing a press conference in Ranchi. The team had just returned from a fact-finding mission to Chatra, where ten members of the CPI(Maoist) had been supposedly killed in a long gun battle with the TPC, a splinter group actively supported by the state government, in March 2013. However, at that time, there were local media reports that the CPI(Maoist) members had been poisoned and then shot to death in a false encounter. The fact-finding team, consisting of members from PUCL Jharkhand, APDR West Bengal and PUDR Delhi, had gone to investigate the veracity of these reports and the circumstances behind the incident. They were in the process of addressing the press and releasing their report while officials of the Jharkhand police, accompanied by a large number of policemen came and picked them up without providing any explanation.

The audaciousness of the act, committed in presence of the assembled press, clearly shows the scant respect for democracy and democratic procedures which the Jharkhand police has. The members of the team, including a woman, were detained in the Kotwali police station for a long time till they were released late in the evening. The police maintained that they had just been picked up for finding information, although it is unclear what information the former were seeking which could only be obtained by picking them up from the venue of a press conference using a posse of armed policemen. This is clearly a tactic of intimidation by the Jharkhand government to dissuade future fact-finding teams from visiting sites of incidents where the state government, or groups supported by the state government, are complicit in criminal activities. However, it is incredible that such a thing can happen in broad daylight and in open view of the public and press. We unequivocally condemn this blatant attack on the activities of democratic rights organizations and the attempt to muzzle them in order to hide the criminal complicity of the state government in encounter killings and other illegal activities.

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Odisha -Group clashes in Gobindapur over Posco

By Express News Service – PARADIP

31st May 2013 12:13 PM

Despite deployment of one platoon of police force, law and order situation worsened in Gobindapur village due to group clash on Thursday. Betel vine demolition drive for proposed Posco steel plant project was affected as tension gripped the village after clashes between two groups of Harijanshai and two youth groups.

According to sources, last week one Samir Das of the village had handed over his betel vine to the administration despite the opposition of villagers in lieu of Rs 1.13 lakh as compensation. Earlier, Das had borrowed Rs 40,000 from another villager Trinath Bhoi to erect betel vine. After Das violated the villagers’ decision, annoyed Bhoi demanded his money back. When Das refused to return the money, Bhoi forcibly tried to extract money from Das leading to clash between two groups.

Nearly 150 Dalit families of the village have been opposing boundary demarcation and trench cutting work for the project. They alleged that the administration had demolished betel vines of nearly 22 Dalit families on the promise of giving new betel vines but nothing has been given as compensation.

“The administration has forcibly acquired our land without paying any compensation. So, we have sought the intervention of the Orissa High Court and Human Rights Commission,’said the villagers.

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