Online Petition demands Withdrawal of Charges against Sundar, Prasad and Others

November 9, 2016

An online petition demanding withdrawal of charges pressed against the academicians and activists by Chhattisgarh police in the case of murder of a tribal villager, has been receiving support not just from India, but also from parts of world like South Africa, UK and USA.

Prof Nandini Sundar

The petition, uploaded by Prof Aparna Sundar addressed to the president, prime minister and home minister of the country, alleges that the charges have been fabricated by police.

On Sunday, Chhattisgarh police booked Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) Professor Archana Prasad, Delhi University (DU) professor Nandini Sundar, Vineet Tiwari of Joshi Adhikar Sansthan, Delhi, Chhattisgarh CPI(M) state secretary Sanjay Parate, Mangalram Karma, and Manju Kawasi, CPI activist and Sarpanch of Guphidi in Sukma district for the alleged murder of a tribal villager Shamnath Baghel on November 4. Baghel had earlier this year complained to the police that Prof Sundar and others are inciting tribals against the government.

SabrangIndia had earlier reported that the Chhattisgarh police had called all the accused academicians and activists ‘Naxals’, and had booked them under sections 120 B (criminal conspiracy), 302 (murder), 147 (punishment for rioting), 148 and 149 of IPC.

However, talking to SabrangIndia, Prof Prasad and Parate had called the allegations ‘bogus’ and had termed it as an attack on activism. Several academicians have since stepped forward showing their support, including JNU Teachers’ Association and the said petitioner.

The petition, which has received support from 404 people so far, elaborates on work done by those named in the FIR in the insurgency-afflicted area and their repeated attempts at achieving peace in Bastar. It has also blamed Chhattisgarh police for fabricating the charges in order to intimidate the activists. It has been endorsed by many users who claim to be belonging to several other countries.

Read the full text of the petition below:

We, the undersigned, are outraged by recent charges of murder that have been laid against Delhi University professor Nandini Sundar, JNU professor Archana Prasad, Vineet Tiwari (of Joshi Adhikar Sansthan, Delhi), Chhattisgarh CPI(M) state secretary, Sanjay Parate, Mangalram Karma, and Manju Kawasi, CPI activist and Sarpanch of Guphidi in Sukma district, by the Chhattisgarh police in the killing of Shamnath Baghel.

The charges are patently fabricated, and follow a pattern of intimidation by the Chhattisgarh police every time evidence is released of their lawless prosecution of the war against the Maoists. Earlier this year, Sundar, Prasad, Tiwari and Parate were part of a fact-finding team that looked at the impact of Maoist violence and state excesses on ordinary villagers in Bastar, finding that they were victims of fake encounters, rapes, arrests, beatings, IED blasts, and killing of informers, implicating Maoists, police, and security forces. The residents of Bastar were also found to be facing the renewal of attacks by civilian militias armed by the state. At that time too, the district administration of Bastar had tried to implicate the fact-finding team on fake charges on the basis of a contrived complaint. More recently, when the police were charge-sheeted on the basis of evidence gathered by Sundar and others for carrying out arson in an operation in 2011, they retaliated by burning effigies of her and other activists and journalists in order to intimidate and incite violence against them.

Sundar and others have put on record their unequivocal condemnation of the killing of Shamnath Baghel. Their writing and interventions on the ongoing war in Bastar have consistently condemned all forms of violence, whether by the state or by the Maoists.

We are saddened by the climate of silencing of dissent that is becoming widespread in India and concerned that the work of researchers, journalists, lawyers and activists is being monitored and controlled to quell critical scrutiny of governmental actions. We believe such silencing of opposing views poses a grave danger to the democratic values of India.

We condemn the police tactics of intimidating and harassing of journalists, lawyers, researchers, political leaders and human rights activists who have been documenting and speaking out against the violence and brutality unleashed by the police, paramilitary, and civilian militias against the local population of Bastar in the war against the Maoists. We demand that the Government of India unconditionally withdraw all charges against all the six persons who have been falsely accused by Chhattisgarh police. We further demand that an inquiry be set up to interrogate the manner in which the police is interfering with law and taking the liberty to frame researchers and activists to create an atmosphere of terror.

US Presidential Election: Scholars from around the World react

November 9, 2016

Donald J Trump has declared victory in the US presidential election. The candidate took the stage in New York just before 3am local time to announce that his rival, Hillary Clinton, had called him to concede the race.

Donald Trump claims victory in New York. Mike Segar/Reuters

“The forgotten men and women of our country will be forgotten no longer,” the president-elect told a packed room of supporters at the Hilton hotel.

“We will get along with all nations willing to get along with us,” he added.

What does this stunning turnaround mean for the rest of the world? The Conversation Global asked a panel of international scholars to reflect on Trump’s election and assess its significance for their region.

Salvador Vazquez del Mercado: Mexico will face hardships under Trump

Donald Trump has won the election against all expectations – except for those of his supporters. The Brexit-like failure to predict his victory will surely haunt pollsters and hurt public confidence in polls for a long time.

The consequences of his victory will, of course, be much graver than the crisis of prediction. Even if Trump comes through with only a fraction of his campaign promises – which seems more likely now that both chambers of Congress will be controlled by Republicans – markets will react quite negatively, the Mexico peso, which has already suffered a significant depreciation, may fall further. And these are only the short-term consequences of Trump’s victory.

The wall along the US-Mexico border may well be impossible to buildand the millions of undocumented immigrants in the US may not be immediately deported. And, hopefully Trump will not use the nuclear codes at all. But his victory still spells severe trouble ahead for Mexicans, and many other minorities living in the US, who were continually vilified during his campaign.

For Mexico, the end of NAFTA would lead to a severe restriction of trade with the US, which, added to an expected increase in interest rates south of the border and a reduction in the remittances sent by Mexicans up north, will quite probably lead to a severe economic crisis.

In the longer term, the relationship between Mexico and the United States will undergo a severe reconfiguration because, come January, Trump will probably take a very aggressive stance against the country. The future is uncharted and, in the short term, quite complicated.

Chintamani Mahapatra: An unusual election outcome

Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election is not a welcome development for the world. But there’s no option but to deal with a man whom the American public has overwhelmingly voted to be the next president of the United States.

The NATO member countries, Japanese, South Koreans, Mexicans and a large number of Muslim countries must have crossed their fingers and are now waiting to see what Trump’s policies towards them will be. Trading partners, especially those that have free trade agreements with the US are also anxious to know about Trump’s trade policy.

The prospective illegal immigrants and prospective Muslim refugees must have been disappointed over the 2016 presidential election outcome. The ISIS must be strategizing to respond to Trump’s “secret plan” to handle the terrorist threat in the Middle East.

At home, large sections of women, African Americans, Hispanics, American Muslims, physically challenged and undocumented workers must have been unsettled by the election results.

However, history tells us that promises and threats made during election campaigns are rarely carried out in words and spirit after election. Donald Trump’s victory speech clearly reflected this when he underlined national unity and a cooperative approach towards countries around the globe.

The individual, political party, the political system and the civil society together determine the politics and process and public policy. The world thus need not worry too much about the things to come during next four years of Trump Administration.

Subarno Chattarji: Trump and India

It is too early to think about the impact of a Donald Trump presidency on India-US relations. Some patterns between the 2014 elections in India and the current one in the US are, however, discernible. Mr. Trump’s election represents the victory of a strong man – “Only I can fix it” – railing against media, political, and intellectual elites in whose favour the system is “rigged”. His victory is indicative of insecurities and resentments amongst a majority and the desire to return to a purer, better, ‘original’ America which was largely white and where everyone knew their place. While American isolationism, exceptionalism, and xenophobia are not new they find unique expression in the figure of Mr. Trump. As with Mr. Trump the Indian Prime Minister was elected on premises and promises of better days and the idea of a charismatic strong man leading the nation out of the morass of poverty, unemployment, secular politics, elites, minority appeasement etc. Like Mr. Trump the current political leadership in India is emblematic of an us-versus-them mentality and intolerant of dissent, critical thinking, or inconvenient institutions. (Unsurprisingly Mr. Trump has fans in India and amongst Indian immigrants in the US). The rightward shift in democracies the world over has specific resonances, parallels in India and the US.

Richard Maher: the view from Europe

In a stunning electoral upset, Donald Trump has defeated Hillary Clinton to become the 45th President of the United States. Virtually every pre-election forecast suggested a comfortable or even decisive Clinton victory. Instead, Trump – a man that many European leaders and citizens view as manifestly unqualified and unprepared for the position – will become president of the world’s sole superpower in January.

Trump’s victory is almost certainly being met across European capitals this morning with alarm, shock, and dread. Trump has called the NATO alliance “obsolete”, spoken admiringly of Russian President Vladimir Putin, and said the British vote in June 2016 to exit the European Union was “a great thing”.

In London, spectators react to the television coverage of election. Hannah McKay/Reuters

Unlike in the United States, the European public was solidly against the idea of a Trump presidency. In a poll published by the Economist on November 8 showing how other countries would vote in the US election, huge majorities favoured Clinton. According to a Pew Research surveypublished in June, overwhelming majorities of Europeans polled said they had “no confidence” that Trump “would do the right thing regarding world affairs”.

Now European leaders must anticipate how a Trump administration will affect transatlantic relations and the many common challenges the United States and Europe face, from an increasingly assertive Russia, a relentless migration crisis that threatens to tear Europe apart, and Britain’s future in the EU.

More broadly, Trump’s election questions the future of US global leadership. Since the end of World War II, the United States, along with key European partners, built and then sustained an open, rules-based international order defined by free trade, military alliances, and international institutions such as the United Nations, International Monetary Fund, and World Bank. With Trump’s victory, the very future of this liberal international order is in peril.

William Case: what Trump’s victory means for Southeast Asia

With so many countries in the region already leaning toward China, does Donald Trump’s election to the US presidency matter for Southeast Asia? It does, at least a little.

To see understand how, imagine what the impact would have been if Hillary Clinton had won. She maintained a strong interest in trade, even if forced by voters during the election campaign to backtrack on the Trans Pacific Partnership. She vigorously denounced China’s takeover of the South China Sea, even as claimants in Southeast Asia have begun to cave in. And she might have retained some of the good will in Indonesia — and in Myanmar — that Barack Obama was able to generate. So Clinton might have slowed, though not reversed, China’s suffocating embrace of Southeast Asia.

After all, Southeast Asia is not a topmost concern for the US. But for China, it is. And China offers leaders in the region irresistible inducements, namely, near bottomless investment and lending for high speed railways, ports, and energy grids. To be sure, as the bills come due and exclusive economic zones are lost, citizens may rue the terms into which their leaders have entered. But by then, Hillary Clinton’s presidency would have passed.

By contrast, with Donald Trump in the White House, Southeast Asia’s entry into China’s orbit will quicken. Indeed, his repudiation of trading relations and security commitments seems to leave countries in the region with no alternative. And his anti-Muslim vitriol will add steam, especially in Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines.

Trump’s presidency, then, will accelerate Southeast Asia’s progress along China’s new Silk Road. But interestingly, by doing so, the costs for Southeast Asia may grow apparent much sooner.

Guests at Hillary Clinton’s election night rally watch returns at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York. Rick Wilking/Reuters

Jay Batongbacal: issues in the South China Sea will go on the back-burner

Donald Trump taking the reins of the US presidency could mark the sunset on Pax Americana in the Asia Pacific, and clear away any remaining resistance to China’s rise to regional preeminence.

A relatively isolationist and localised focus on the part of his administration as he attempts to fulfil his electoral promises would likely leave issues such as the South China Sea on the back-burner. ASEAN hedging patterns will cause member states to gravitate towards China even more.

The US rebalancing in Asia under President Barack Obama, and the country’s alliance commitments in the region could also be severely undermined given Trump’s lack of appreciation for the role played by America’s security relationships in US global political and economic leadership. The only hindrance to this lies in the fact that US geostrategic policy for the Asia-Pacific has been a largely bipartisan matter in the US Congress.

But Trump’s tenuous links to the Republican Party, lack of real leadership thereof, and non-attachment to Republican ideals, puts into question the responsiveness and effectiveness of that policy in the face of more solid and coordinated leadership within regional powers such as China and Russia, which will have an unparalleled opportunity to fill in any voids the US may leave.

For the Philippines and its President Rodrigo Duterte, this is a fortunate coincidence as it accommodates his oft-stated aversion to US influence and commentary on his domestic policy, and distrust of the US.

Authored by:
William Case
Professor of Comparative Politics, City University Hong Kong

Janjira Sombatpoonsiri
Assistant Professor, Thammasat University

Jay Batongbacal
Associate Professor of Law, University of the Philippines

Richard Maher
Research Fellow, Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies

Salvador Vázquez del Mercado
Lecturer on Public Opinion and Research Methodology, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)

(This article was first published on Conversation.com.)

A Colossal Calamity, Decreasing Sex Ratio: Supreme Court

November 9, 2016

Poor implementation of the law against sex selective abortion, the Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act of 1994 remains a pressing problem in the country, ruled the Supreme Court

The selective abortion of female foetuses is a social ill of huge dimensions and the pervasive prenatal sex determination tests a means used for this selective action. A Bench of Justices Dipak Misra and Shiva Kirti Singh have issued directions in a PIL filed by the Voluntary Health Association of Punjab. In its judgment, the Bench takes strong offence to the practice of female foeticide, noting,

“When a female foetus is destroyed through artificial means which is legally impermissible, the dignity of life of a woman to be born is extinguished. It corrodes the human values. The Legislature has brought a complete code and it subserves the constitutional purpose.”

The Supreme Court had previously issued several directions in March of 2013 in the case of Voluntary Health Association of Punjab v. Union of India & Ors., expressing its concern about female foeticide and the reduction of sex ratio. In fact, way back in 2001 as well, the apex court had passed a number of directions for the effective implementation of the PNDT Act.

In a country notorious for following law more in breach, the plummeting child sex ratio should come as no surprise. The Supreme Court’s move is a welcome one. Key takeaways from the judgment delivered yesterday include recommendations that the courts which deal with the complaints under the Act be fast tracked, and requested the concerned High Courts to issue directions in that regard.

The Bench also directed the Chief Justices of each of the High Courts in the country to constitute a committee of three judges to periodically oversee the progress of the cases.

These fresh directions come barely weeks after a Bench headed by Justice Misra rebuked Google, Microsoft and Yahoo’s search engines for showing content on sex determination on its websites. The observations were made in a PIL filed by a member of the National Inspection and Monitoring Committee, Sabu Mathew George.

Interestingly, George had also sought intervention in the present matter, and was represented by Anitha Shenoy. Colin Gonsalves appeared for the petitioner, and Sanjay Parikh for the Union of India.

Click here to read full judgment.

What agitates Kashmiris & What’s to be done? Fact-finding Report of Concerned Citizens’ Group

November 9, 2016

The 5-member group of “concerned citizens” led by BJP leader Yashwant Sinha has submitted its findings to the Home Ministry in Delhi. This report has been released to the media too, not however receiving the coverage it deserves. The group had visited Kashmir on October 25 for three days during which it met various people from across Kashmir’s ideological divide.

Brief Report of a Visit by Concerned Citizens’ Group to Srinagar

A group consisting of concerned citizens visited Srinagar from October 25-27, 2016.

Centre for Dialogue and Reconciliation played a catalytic role in facilitating this visit and arranged its programme in Srinagar. The group was not, however, limited to any ideology or institution and was not sponsored by anyone.

Although former minister, Mr. Jairam Ramesh of the Congress and former MP Ms. Brinda Karat of the CPI (M) were also scheduled to join the group, they were unable to do so for various personal reasons.

The visiting group consisted of the following:
1. Yashwant Sinha (Former External Affairs Minister )
2. Wajahat Habibullah (Former Chief Information Commissioner and former Chairman of National Minorities Commission)
3. Air Vice Marshal (Retd) KapilKak
4. Bharat Bhushan (Editor, Catchnews) and
5. Sushobha Barve(Executive Program Director of Centre for Dialogue and Reconciliation – CDR)
Everyone paid for their own expenses and no security or financial help was accepted from any institution or government body to ensure that the integrity of the group as concerned citizens was maintained.
The group had the following meetings in Srinagar over three days (October 25, 26 and 27:

25th October
11.45AM – 12.45 PM    Meeting Syed Ali Geelani at his residence
(Present at the meeting were his two sons, Dr Nayeem Geelani and Mr Naseem Geelani as well as one Yusuf Mujahid/Mushahid and a video cameraman)
2.00 PM – 3.00 PM    Meeting with Mirwaiz Umar Farooq at his residence.
(Except the group members, no one else was present at this meeting with the Mirwaiz)
5.00 PM – 6.00 PM    Meeting with Prof. Abdul Ghani Bhat at his residence
(Except the group members, no one else was present at this meeting with Prof. Bhat)
6.15 PM – 7.00 PM    Meeting with Shabbir Shah at Raj Bagh Police Station (Group members met him minus Yashwant Sinha)
8.00 PM    Separate Meetings with Dr. Farooq Abdullah and Mr. Vijay Dhar

26th October
10.00 PM – 11.00 PM    Meeting with Kashmir Chamber of Commerce and Industry
(About a dozen past and present office bearers of the KCCI were present)
11.30 PM – 12.30 PM    Meeting with Kashmir Economic Alliance at Hotel Grand Mumtaz
(About 20 members of various trade and commerce unions were present)
1.00 – 2.00 pm    Meeting with Kashmiri Pandit Sangharsh Samiti members
2.00 PM – 3.00 PM    Meeting with intellectuals – academics, writers/journalists, doctors at Comrade Inn Hotel, Raj Bagh
3.30 PM- 4.30 PM    Meeting with members of Kashmir Centre for Development Studies at Comrade Inn Hotel, Raj Bagh.
5.00 PM – 6.00 PM    Meeting with High Court Bar Association
8.00 pm    Dinner meeting with Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti (No officials present)

27th October
9.30 AM    Second meeting with Syed Ali Shah Geelani at his residence (minus Yashwant Sinha and Wajahat Habibullah )
11.30 AM    Meeting with the Governor N N Vohra (No officials present)
2.00 pm    Meetings with Members of Kashmir Hoteliers Association
The meetings with Main stream political leaders – Dr. Farooq Abdullah, Mr Saifuddin Soz and Mr. Yousuf Tarigami who are supporting this initiative were by individual members of the group. All of them were unanimous in welcoming the group’s visit and talks with the Hurriyat leaders. Members also met separately with other civil society organizations……

BASIC FINDINGS:
Across the political spectrum, the Kashmiris we met spoke to virtually the same script about the history of the Kashmir issue. They may have varied in the exposition of a particular issue but basically all of them argued for a political solution to what they perceived as a political issue. They made the point that this is the fifth generation of Kashmiris which was protesting but to no avail.

Each one spent a considerable amount of time recounting the activities of the security forces which had alienated the population of the Valley. Our interlocutors told us the reasons for the immediate anger and the long term anger which we are quoting below without endorsing them –

REASONS FOR IMMEDIATE ANGER:

A person, who received back injuries, being treated in Srinagar’s SMHS hospital on Thursday. Dozens of persons from Khrew –Pampore in South Kashmir’s Pulwama district were allegedly left injured after the army and Special Operation Group (SOG) raided their residences last night and beat them up ruthlessly A person, who received back injuries, being treated in Srinagar’s SMHS hospital on Thursday. PHOTO BY BILAL BAHADUR

1. Excessive use of force by the security forces

The violence which began with the funeral procession of slain militant Burhan Wani has so far resulted in the death of nearly a hundred people. The question that most Kashmiris are asking is: Why were unarmed people going to offer last prayers for Burhan Wani fired at? They were not carrying any sticks, firearms or grenades that they represented a threat to the security forces. Nor did they attack the security forces. The firing at the funeral processions (there were nearly two lakh people gathered for the funeral and the last Namaz Janaza for Burhan Wani had been offered 40 times) is being seen as action of unaccountable security personnel and is being projected as an example of India’s ‘inhumanity’.
The business and trading community is claiming that in the current situation it is not bothered about profit and loss but human loss and about the worsening situation in the Valley. They want an amicable resolution and end to violence by the security forces.

2. Use of pellet guns

Use of pellet guns for crowd control was the sorest point of all conversation with Kashmiris we met. They want the pellet guns banned and cannot understand why GoI is delaying this decision and why Indian security establishment is reluctant to give up this weapon.

The use of pellet guns has led to several people, including children – some as young as 4-years-old – being blinded or partially blinded. These weapons, the Kashmiris point out, are not used in the rest of India even under grave provocation. They were not used in the Jat agitation in Haryana, the protests against Cauvery water sharing in Karnataka or the Patel agitation in Gujarat. All these agitations had resulted in large-scale damage to public property and in some cases even in gang rape of innocent women as in Haryana. Yet pellet guns were not used against the protestors. The fact that the use of pellet guns was reserved only for Kashmir elicited the most amount of anger against India and Indian security forces in the people we talked to.

Asked about stone-pelting, most Kashmiri leaders denied that youngsters were being paid to throw stones. They claimed that this was being done in ‘self-defence’ by unarmed people protesting against India.

Laptops in their hands! Damaged in forces action during raid in Barzulla on Oct 23, 2016 at 4:30 AM. (KL Image: Bilal Bahadur)

3. Night-time raids by security forces

These are ostensibly search operations which have resulted in destruction of property at Kashmir homes –windows, doors, and household goods. Apparently electrical and electronic gadgets are destroyed in the name of search operations. This continues even when the search operation yields nothing.

One explanation we heard of this was that because the security forces get pelted with stones while returning to camp in the evening, they go back at night in anger to take revenge. That revenge in the form of wanton destruction of property to punish the people.

Youth arrested by police at Bemina.

4. Misuse of Public Safety Act (PSA)

The PSA is seen as a revolving door process by the Kashmiris to keep people in jail. Brought into being to deal with timber smugglers by Sheikh Abdullah this draconian law, which does not require the victim to be produced before a magistrate and charged for up to a year, is used to keep trouble-makers in jail for longer than a year. As they are released in one case, another one under PSA is slapped on them in a different police jurisdiction.

However, the major misuse of the PSA is against minors. The amended Juvenile Justice Act for the state does not allow the police to arrest minors under PSA. Yet this has happened on a significant scale. The separatist leaders claim the number is about 6,000 while government sources place the figure at slightly less than half at 2,500. Even this is a large number of children. As there are no juvenile homes or Borstals for confining minors in J&K, they are kept with hardened criminals which can have long term deleterious impact on the minors imprisoned.

Kashmir leaders also allege that people arrested from the Valley are being housed in jails in the Jammu region so that their families cannot get easy access to them. This they claim is against a Surpeme Court order. Kashmir, they claim, has also become the only state which has run out of jail space and seeking to transfer the overspill to jails in MP and other states.

5. Destruction of electric transformers and crops in rural areas

A strange phenomenon of destruction of electric transformers in rural Kashmir is being reported. Apparently over 200 transformers have been destroyed – allegedly by the security forces. This again is apparently aimed at punishing villagers for either pelting stones at them or protesting against them.

There have also been some cases of standing paddy crop ready for harvesting being set on fire at some places. It is not known who is behind this. However, the news of such incidents – some verified and others unverified — is also fanning anger amongst people.

Scores of students marched on Residency Road in Srinagar on Sep 29, 2016 demanding resolution of Kashmir Issue. (KL Image: Bilal Bahadur)

6. Attacks on Kashmiris outside J&K

There have been some reports of Kashmiri students as well as some Kashmiri traders being attacked in states outside J&K. The Kashmiri people want the safety of students and traders to be ensured by the GoI.

With everyone we strongly raised the issue of opening of schools.

REASONS FOR LONG TERM ANGER:

1. Refusal to recognize Kashmir as a politically contentious issue
Across the cross section of people we met there was anguish about India not recognizing that Kashmir was a dispute. The refusal to see Kashmir as a political issue, people claimed, had resulted in the present situation because a political issue cannot be solved through law and order measures.

2. Refusal to recognize the emotional and sentimental aspects of the Kashmir issue
India, Kashmiri separatist leaders believe, has not understood the wounded psyche of the Kashmiri people. Therefore, it is unable to understand why Kashmiris have locked horns with the world’s largest democracy.

Their argument is that because India does not see the psycho-historical aspects of the problem it tries to reduce it to issues of lack of development or economic growth, need to create jobs or offering economic packages and incentives.

This has not suppressed the sense of hurt in the Kashmiri people or quell their political aspirations because these measures do not address the political issue of Kashmir.

3. Designating all Kashmiris as Pakistani puppets
There is also anger among Kashmiris that everything that happens in the Valley is being seen through the Pakistan prism and that this is being done to deny that they are free agents who are raising their own issues with India.

Another consequence of equating the protests in Kashmir with Pakistani machinations, they believe, is that every protesting Kashmiri can be equated with a terrorist and leadership, especially the Hurriyat Conference, is projected on a par with extremists when in fact, it was organised as the political face of a peaceful protest movement.

Even if GoI gets upset with the Azadi slogans, they argue, there is a need to recognize that the Kashmiris are upset and there is a sentiment for Azadi; and that this has little to do with Pakistan. Protestors pick up Pakistani and Chinese flags not because they want to solicit support from these countries but because they know that this riles India. And they want to rile India because it does not listen to them. “If everything that happens here is because of Pakistan, then what are we doing here?” a Hurriyat leader asked.

Prime Minister NarendraModi (right) with his Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in Lahore on Friday

4. No dialogue with Pakistan
Kashmiri separatist leaders also think that unless India and Pakistan talk there can be no permanent solution to the Kashmir issue. While most of them recommend tripartite talks on Kashmir between India, Pakistan and the Kashmiri leadership (without specifying which leadership), others are willing for some other form of dialogue between the three as in Vajpayee’s time. They called it “triangular dialogue” – presumably one in which India and Pakistan talk to each other and each of them then talks to the Kashmiris also.

There is widespread belief that without engaging Pakistan there can be no resolution of the Kashmir issue.

Hurriyat (M) Leaders with the then Prime Minister of India, AtalBihari Vajpayee.

5. Vajpayee line on Kashmir jettisoned
Most Kashmiris believe that Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee was sincere in his approach to resolving the Kashmir tangle. They quoted him as saying that Kashmir is an issue which needs to be resolved and that even if Kashmiris want to distance themselves, even that had to be done through cooperation and goodwill.

They believe that Vajpayee saw the human aspect of the Kashmir issue and there was a need to once again appreciate the humanitarian aspects of the issue, irrespective of the state of India-Pakistan relations.

6. Indian public is indifferent to the plight of Kashmiris
Kashmiri separatist leaders believe that while Indian citizens are politically quite aware and quick to question the government, when it comes to the Kashmir issue, they keep quiet. This, they believe, is because they have been conditioned and encouraged to view the developments in Kashmir through anti-Pakistan glasses. GoI’s approach to Kashmir also pushes this point of view. As a consequence, even politically aware Indian citizens have no time for Kashmir.

7. Kashmir being pushed towards anarchy
The situation in the Valley is not being controlled by the separatist leaders as they were all in jail for four months since the day after BurhanWani’s death. The Hurriyat leaders admitted that the street protester is not under anyone’s control. The streets are being controlled by youngsters who give the call for spontaneous protests. If this continued, they think that they would lose whatever little authority they exercise over the local population and they would not be able to give the protests any political direction.

If such an anarchic situation was to develop in Kashmir, then India would have no reasonable person to talk to, they claim.

8. Kashmiri Pandits living in the Valley
The Kashmiri Pandits who have continued to live in the valley since 1990’s want to be treated on par with Kashmiri migrants and be given same benefits as them because in a sense they are also migrants who have shifted from the original villages to towns. This had been agreed to by the former PM Dr. Manmohan Singh but never implemented. Because of the ongoing agitation, many of the Pandit families, whose breadwinners were employees of commercial establishments were now deprived of a livelihood. The Kashmiri Pandits fear that in light of breakdown of law and order and withdrawal of security their own security was compromised leading to the migration of employees to Jammu where they were not getting salaries unlike other employees who were not able to their offices.In consequence, out of remaining 850 familes, 350 families were planning to migrate.

9. Regression from autonomy to uniformity; togetherness to communalism
Kashmiris believe that today Indian politics has taken such a turn that there is no willingness to listen to even demands for autonomy. Today Kashmir issue is being seen as Hindu vs. Muslim and governance is seen as Jammu vs. Kashmir.

RECOMMENDATIONS: WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE:

The sense of despair and desperation in Kashmir is increasing by the day. There was unanimity among the civil society and mainstream political leaders that dialogue must begin with the inclusion of the separatist political leaders.
The question then is how to ease the existence of ordinary Kashmiris while leaving aside the complexities of resolving the Kashmir issue permanently.

Protesters throw stones at police after clashes erupted in old city following killing of a civilian by forces near martyrs graveyard, during his funeral in Srinagar, Wednesday, Aug. 3, 2016. (KL Image: Bilal Bahadur)

After listening to a cross-section of Kashmiri voices, the group came to the conclusion that some small steps can be taken by the State government and the Union government to bring some semblance of normality in Kashmir. These proposed steps are listed below.

Steps that the J&K state government can take:
1. Start the process of reopening schools and as a precursor to this, release forthwith all first time offender school children and minors arrested under PSA.*

2. Consider postponing school examinations to a later date instead of insisting on holding them from November 15. Children who have been in jail have not probably had access to textbooks and other teaching material. They should be given sufficient time to prepare for exams.*

3. Repeat offenders amongst minors must be shifted out of adult jails and put up in temporarily designated juvenile detention centres and given psychological counseling.

4. Compensation must be announced for the next of kin of the civilians killed and for those wounded in police or action by the other security forces. This money may be transferred as DBT to designated accounts to prevent extortion and rent-seeking from the suffering families by the state bureaucracy.

5. Rehabilitation packages must be announced to ensure the life-time income needs of those permanently blinded by pellet guns.

6. Compensation and free treatment (both in India and abroad, if necessary) at state government expense for those who have been partially blinded by pallet guns.

7. Set up a blind school in Srinagar for children blinded by pellet guns. The state does not have a blind school and this may be a means of rehabilitation by the state to provide education for children with blindness or partially blindness.

8. Order a judicial commission into excesses by the police, especially the wanton use of pellet guns. While it is widely accepted that such commissions rarely lead to any conclusions, they serve a therapeutic purpose of allowing people to emotionally express themselves and it also helps project the state government as an accountable institution.

*Syed Ali Shah Geelani reciprocated this sentiment when the group met him for a second time to urge him to allow children to go to school, although he couched this in rhetoric that made it the responsibility of the state government to provide the secure conditions for children to attend school.

PM NarendraModi in Srinagar on November 07, 2015. (KL file Image: Bilal Bahadur)

Steps that the Union government can take
1. Ban the pellet gun with immediate effect as a crowd control weapon. This will have a salutary impact on the Kashmiris. This is not something that should be left to committees or to the security forces.
2. Work with the media not to escalate the situation in Kashmir. Educate media owners about the sensitive nature of the Kashmir issue and not add fuel to the fire in search of viewers and revenue.
3. Dispel the perception that Kashmir and Kashmiris are mere tools to be used for electoral purposes.
4. In its interactions with Kashmiris the centre might reiterate the approach enunciated by the Hon’ble PM that Kashmiris are Indians.
5. GoI move quickly to give facilities of migrants to Pandits continuing to reside in Kashmir Division of J&K.

Although separatist leaders like Syed Ali Shah Geelani and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq talked of being prepared for a dialogue (Geelani talked of “unconditional” talks), it was not within the competence of this group of concerned citizens to suggest when or if such a dialogue process should be started.

However, what we would like to emphasise is that we noted an overwhelming sentiment amongst the Kashmiris we interacted with for setting up a permanent process of dialogue with New Delhi. One of the reasons why so many doors were opened for us by the separatists and ordinary Kashmiris alike was because they saw our visit as a beginning of engagement with ordinary Indians.

The agenda of alliance of the BJP-PDP Coalition Government also commits to a dialogue with all the stakeholders. We recommend that such a dialogue is initiated at the earliest.

The Kashmiris we interacted with acknowledged that we had limitations in leveraging the complexities of the Kashmir issue. Yet, there was a consensus that we repeat our visit and continue this engagement with them.

Yashwant Sinha (Former Foreign Minister)
Wajahat Habibullah (Former Chairman Minorities Commission)
Kapil Kak (AVM-R)
Bharat Bhushan (Editor, Catch News)
Sushobha Barve (Programme Director, Centre for Dialogue & Reconciliation)

Modi Government’s Move Insensitive to Common People, Reveals a Blinkered View of Black Money: Prabhat Patnaik

November 9, 2016

Demonetization of currency notes by the Modi Govt on November 8

Narendra Modi went on national television at 8 p.m. on November 8 to announce that from midnight of that very date, i.e. in a mere four hours’ time, 500 and 1000 rupee notes would cease to be legal-tender. The justification advanced for this bizarre move was that it would strike at “black money”. An additional argument was thrown in, to the effect that fake currency notes used by “terrorists” would now cease to be effective; and some particularly enthusiastic supporters of the government even went to the extent of calling it a “surgical strike against terrorism”.

I shall come to the fake currency issue later. Let me first look at the “black money” argument which even President Pranab Mukherjee has gone out of his way to endorse. Thisargument,namely that the demonetization of 500 and 1000 rupee notes constitutes an attack on “black money”,is based on an utter lack of understanding of the nature of “black money,” a conception of it that is staggering in its simple-mindedness.

The implicit understanding is that “black money” consists of hoards of cash which are held in trunks or pillowcases or buried under the earth. With this understanding, it is then suggested that if 500 and 1000 rupee notes are demonetized, then people going to banks to exchange large amounts of old notes for the new legal tender would make the banks suspicious; and banks in turn would convey their suspicions to the tax authorities who would then catch the culprits. “Black money” would thus get exposed, and this would discourage further transgressions in future.

The demonetization of 500 and 1000 rupee notes constitutes an attack on “black money”, is based on an utter lack of understanding of the nature of “black money,” a conception of it that is staggering in its simple-mindedness.

Now, the second part of this argument, even assuming that “black money” actually consists of cash-hoards, makes little sense. If a person possesses, say, unaccounted money of Rs.20 crore, and that too in 500 and 1000 rupee notes, then such a person will certainly not come with the entire Rs.20 crores to a bank to change it into the new legal-tender (he will not be allowed to do so anyway); he would rather send several factotums to the bank, each carrying a small amount, and would do so over a number of days prior to the December 30 deadline. In fact even this prolonged effort would be unnecessary, since all sorts of intermediaries would come up fairly soon who would do this job of exchanging old notes for new ones on behalf of customers for a consideration. With such “black operators”, exchanging “black money” from the old legal tender to the new legal tender, the idea, mooted by “experts” on several TV channels, that demonetizing 500 and 1000 rupee notes would unearth illegal cash-hoards makes little sense.

More importantly, however, this very conception of “black money” is absurd. Indeed the term “black money” itself is a misnomer, since it conjures up the image of a stock of money which is supposed to be held not openly, in the form of bank deposits, but clandestinely in the form of currency notes, and that too in pillowcases or in containers buried in the earth. Actually when we talk of “black money” we have in mind a whole set of activities which are either entirely illegal, such as smuggling, or drug-running,or procuring arms for terrorist organizations, or are undertaken in excess of what is legally permitted, or are not declared at all so that taxes are not paid on them. If 100 tonnes of minerals are extracted but only 80 tonnes are declared to be extracted, in order to reduce tax payment, then we have a case of “black money” being generated. Likewise, if $100 of exports are undertaken but only $80 are declared, and the remainder $20 are kept abroad in Swiss Banks, which is against the law, then we have a case of “black money” being generated. Or if rupees are changed into foreign exchange through the hawala route and kept as deposits abroad, then we have a case of “black money” being generated. In short, “black money” refers to a whole set of undeclared activities.

“Black money”, it follows,refers not to a stock but to a flow. ”Black activities”, like “white activities”,are meant to earn profits for those engaged in them; and simply keeping a hoard of money earns no profits. What Marx had said about business activities also holds about “black activities”, namely that profits are earned not by hoarding money but by throwing it into circulation; the “miser” does the former, the capitalist the latter. And those engaged in “black activities” are capitalists not misers. Of course, in any business money is also held for a shorter or longer period (e.g. during the C-M-C circuit); but this is true as much for “white activities” as for “black activities”, so that the belief that the differentia specifica of “black money” is that it is held while “white money” is used for circulation, is completely without any basis.All money circulates, with occasional pauses when it is held, whether it is employed in “black activities” or “white activities”. The essence of unearthing “black money” lies therefore in tracking down “black activities”, not in attacking money-holdings per se. And this requires honest, systematic, and painstaking investigation.

Long before the days of computers, the British Internal Revenue Service had earned the reputation that it would eventually catch up with any tax defaulter simply through a process of grinding and meticulous investigation. True, Britain is a small country compared to India, but that only means that the size of the tax administering personnel has to be larger, tailored to the needs of the country; and if this is done, then unearthing “black money”, at least in the domestic economy, is merely a matter of patient and efficient tax administration.

“Black money”, it follows, refers not to a stock but to a flow…The essence of unearthing “black money” lies therefore in tracking down “black activities”, not in attacking money-holdings per se. And this requires honest, systematic, and painstaking investigation.

A sizeable portion of “black activities”, however, is operated through banks located abroad; indeed some would say that this constitutes much the larger portion.NarendraModi himself before his election had talked of “bringing back” the “black money” stashed abroad, suggesting that the bulk of “black money” was located abroad, even though his remark displayed the same naïve understanding that “black money” referred to a hoard rather than to a range of activities. But if foreign banks constitute the predominant source of funding “black activities”, then the demonetization of 500 and 1000 rupee notes, while causing much hardship to ordinary people, will do little to eliminate such activities.

This is not the first time that such demonetization of currency notes has occurred in India. In January 1946, the 1000 and 10000 rupee notes were demonetized; and in 1978 the Morarji Desai government had demonetized 1000, 5000 and 10000 rupee notes from the midnight of January 16. But even in 1978, let alone in 1946, this had caused no hardships for the ordinary people, since most of them had scarcely ever seen such a note, let alone possess one. (Even in 1978 Rs.1000 was a lot of money and common people hardly saw notes of 1000-rupee denomination). But that move of the Morarji Desai government, even though it did not impinge on common people, did not end the scourge of “black money” either.The Modi government’s move, while equally ineffective in countering “black money”, has the added flaw of impinging severely on common people.

Some have argued that, whether or not the demonetization of 500 and 1000 rupee notes itself has the effect of countering “black money”, it represents a long-term move away from a cash-using economy, and amounts in that sense to a restraint on unaccounted activities that are typically not financed through recognized institutional channels. But quite apart from the fact that “black activities” financed through foreign banks will still escape detection in a cashless India, the very idea of a cashless India represents a pipedream of a segment of the elite, which is totally unaware of the difficulty that a common person faces in obtaining a credit card, or even opening a bank account (despite Modi’s loud boasts about expanding people’s bankability). The move towards a cashless economy, while not being realized, will simply become an additional means through which the common people will get squeezed.

But, what about the other argument that such demonetization acts against terrorism by preventing the circulation of fake currency notes printed “across the border”? This argument hinges crucially on the assumption that the technology employed in printing the new legal tender will prevent any possibility of faking it. Let us accept that assumption. Even so, the introduction of such new legal tenderwhich cannot be faked, at the expense of the existing legal tender, could have been effected in a gradual and altogether unobtrusive manner, exactly as the introduction of new currency notes in lieu of the old ones is routinely effected. It is not as if the government was expecting an avalanche of fake notes on the night of November 8; why could it not have avoided the sudden, surprising, and massive attack on the security and convenience of the people that it launched on the night of November 8?

What the Modi government has done is unprecedented in the history of modern India. Even the colonial government had shown greater sensitivity to the convenience of the people than the Modi government has done by demonetizing only those notes which were possessed by the super-rich and not those possessed by the people at large. This “emergency measure”, however, is in line with the numerous other measures being currently pursued by the Modi government which has embarked on an undeclared “Emergency”: it is as fatuous as it is against the people.

(The author is a renowned economist and this article was written for People’s Democracy and is being reproduced with permission)

Bar dancers entertain crowd in BJP’s parivartan yatra, flagged off by Amit Shah

November 9, 2016

BJP’s much-publicised parivartan yatra, which was flagged off by Amit Shah two days ago, has become a topic of intense conversation on social media platforms because of association of bar dancers.

The video of bar dancer being used to woo the voters has gone viral on Twitter and Facebook.

On Monday, the yatra (road show) reached Tugana in Bagpat area of Uttar Pradesh. Senior party leaders including Sanjeev Balyan (minister in Narendra Modi’s cabinet) and Satyapal Singh (BJP MP) were expected to address the crowd.

But when they didn’t arrive at the venue at the scheduled time, the panic set in and the local leaders decided to entertain the crowd by employing a bar dancer.

A local BJP leader, wishing to be unidentified, told Janta Ka Reporter that the decision was taken because ‘we didn’t want crowds to leave.’

He said, “We saw what happened to Amit Shah ji’s rally in Lucknow in September, when lakhs of chairs remained unoccupied. We didn’t want the same to happen here particularly during our leaders’ speeches. There’s nothing wrong if we organised a little bit of entertainment for the crowd.”

Courtesy: Janta ka Reporter

Teaching gender inequality in Sri Lanka

November 9, 2016

Sri Lanka has been lauded for equal access to education for girls and boys, but textbooks and traditions continue to play a role in perpetuating inequitable gender norms and stereotypes.

Sri Lanka has in some circles been considered a model of post-colonial gender equality compared to its South Asian counterparts due to high literacy rates for men and women, 97.7 and 98.6 respectively, universal franchise for both sexes as early as 1931, and two female state leaders. Sri Lanka’s long history of free and compulsory education for boys and girls which was achieved shortly after independence, and girls’ equal access to education and gender parity in all three levels (primary, secondary, and tertiary) of education has been an important contributing factor to this idea of gender equality.

Yet women still continue to grapple with the same old questions of gender inequality in Sri Lanka. In addition to experiencing high levels of gender based violence, women’s labour force participation is half that of men and double their unemployment rates. In 2013 only 35 percent of the working population were women. Women continue to be under represented in upper level management and decision making positions in both the private and public sector. Equal participation, retention, and performance by girls in education has not led to equal representation of women within decision making. A glass ceiling continues to keep women out of governance. Currently there is only a five percent representation of women in parliament and two percent in local government. Which begs the question, what is going on here, why haven’t gains in education translated to economically independent and empowered women in Sri Lanka?

Education is often championed for its transformative possibilities related to liberation, empowerment, social justice, individual freedoms, human rights, and the reduction of social inequities such as gender inequality. From this perspective, education is regarded as a means that will enable learners to think critically and have the ability to challenge the status quo. Schools are sites for the construction of girls’ and women’s identities and should ideally contribute to their active role in society. Generally, however, education systems reflect and help to reinforce the prevailing power arrangements of the state and society. Many education reforms focus more on utilitarian goals, such as the transmission of knowledge and skills, to help learners become contributing members of the existing and often hegemonic, political, economic, and social order. This has been the case in Sri Lanka, where utilitarian goals have side-lined the agenda of promoting values of gender equality. Rather than challenging gender norms and stereotypes, education has played a significant role in perpetuating them.

Sri Lankan classrooms are often embedded with gender boundaries that reproduce powerful patriarchal hierarchies. Interviews with civics teachers, analysis of the civics curriculum, discussion with students and classroom observations show that there exist two key challenges to promoting gender equality in Sri Lanka through education. These include strong gender biases and ideologies held by teachers and a curriculum particularly social studies and civics curricula and a school system that emphasizes the protection of culture and tradition at all cost. These factors work in tandem to maintain the status quo when it comes to challenging traditional gender norms.

Teachers generally hold strong gender biases based on their own upbringing and ideologies. Though they agree that gender equality is important, many teachers believe that because girls are doing so well in schools there is in fact no gender inequality in schools or Sri Lanka for that matter. This may be true on the surface level with respect to the classroom, where girls are on equal footing with the boys in classroom discussion and marks. The differences are apparent in the subtle hidden curriculum of the day-to-day practices of teachers and students. Whether it is the way teachers only call upon female students to sweep classrooms or ask only the male students to move desks, gender roles and responsibilities are assigned in the day to day life of the school through teacher-student and student-student interactions.

Some teachers took the “I don’t differentiate between girls and boys” stance, not understanding the need to move beyond the equal treatment of boys and girls to the equitable treatment of them. The characteristics attributed to boys and girls respectively also impacted their engagement in learning. For example, many teachers and students felt that girls were better in the social science subjects because they were patient and good at memorizing information. Boys were perceived to be adventurous, problem solvers who could think outside of the box and therefore are more suited to science and technology subjects. One can only imagine the detrimental effects these fixed expectations have on girls AND boys.

The gendered expectations of teachers are reflected in the students’ civics textbooks that promote gendered forms of citizenship, which is further protected with the seal of tradition, and culture, thus creating a rift in the way boys and girls are able to engage in society. The mandatory civics curriculum from grades 6-9 continues to depict men and women and girls and boys in outdated traditional gender roles, despite mandates by the Ministry of Education to avoid gender biases in textbooks. Much of the text feature male role models and historical figures. In rare instances there are images of girls in leadership roles; however, these instances are relegated to the school. Images related to men and women’s roles in society, such as work, or family conform to traditional fixed gender roles, thus reinforcing the status quo that although women have full access to education they should still maintain their traditional roles in society in and outside of the home.

The disparity in gender roles is further reinforced with an emphasis on the theme of the protection of traditions, cultures, and customs. In all of the textbooks examined, there was a strong and repeated emphasis on the need to follow traditions. For example, the grade nine civics textbook states, “Social Security is ensured by virtue of the individual upholding the customs and manners, social values, rules and regulations as well as traditions that prevail in society” and the grade seven texts states, “You should be well aware of the traditions followed by members of the family. You should vehemently follow and practise these traditions”. The depiction of women and men in traditional gender roles alongside the emphasis on the need to follow tradition to uphold society leaves very little space for teachers or students to challenge the status quo. Interlinked with tradition is the family, a space that is exulted as sacred and foundational to the core of society. The civics textbook creates a direct link between the family unit and the nation as a whole throughout all of the grades. One should be obedient to the leaders of the nation just as one is obedient to the head of the household i.e. the father. Thus the curriculum and classroom are essentially grooming girls to become good (well educated) mothers and wives and boys into providers and leaders in society.

Students and teachers, particularly in war affected communities, echoed the text books’ emphasis on holding on to tradition, culture, and family values. This is in response to the destabilization of the traditional family unit as a result of three decades of war and the rapid influence of globalization. War affected communities had been sheltered from mass media and globalization for close to 30 years and are now dealing with the consequences of open access to everything from Facebook to pornography. Many teachers and students’ response to this is to fall back to traditional values and norms. Some teachers and students felt that the influence of social media on the way women dressed was leading to the increase in gender violence against women. The example provided was the predominance of young women wearing leggings rather than traditional clothing. There is a growing belief that the shift away from tradition puts women at risk of violence and that it is in some ways warranted because women had strayed from the model of the traditional good women. This creates a dangerous space for women and girls who may challenge the status quo.

Even though education in post-war Sri Lanka is contributing to reinforcing gender norms rather than challenging them, currently there is a significant gap in knowledge and understanding of the link between education and subtle day to day practices that devalue women and girls. A fixation with equal access has led to a dangerous complacency that facilitates and normalizes inequity. Officials and policy makers often fail to consider that the content of education perpetuates negative norms and stereotypes. Challenging these deeply entrenched practices will require the explicit integration of gender equality training for all those involved in the education system from policy makers to teachers. But before that policy makers at the highest level need to confront their own ideologies and have an open and honest conversations on how long we are going to continue to hide behind gender parity, tradition, and the traditional family unit to allow gender inequality to persist in Sri Lanka.

Thursica Kovinthan is a doctoral candidate and Vanier scholar at the Faculty of Education, University of Ottawa. Her research interests include gender, citizenship, refugees, and post-conflict education

This article was first published on Open Democracy

“Rs 2000 Notes will also have Jio Sim with 4G connection!” What Zee News didn’t report

November 9, 2016

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement on demonetisation of Rs 500 and Rs 1000 caused ripples across India as people thronged ATMs, petrol pumps and grocery shops in their desperation to use as much of their unused cash as possible.

Modi, in his announcement, said that Rs 500 and Rs 1000 will become illegal from the midnight of 9 November and they will be replaced by new Rs 500 and Rs 2000 notes.

While the BJP’s political detractors such as Mamata Banerjee, CPI-M and Congress slammed Modi for his ‘draconian’ decision, his supporters in the party and media were nimble-footed in singing praises for him.

Awe struck by Modi’s supposed ‘masterstroke,’ Zee News owned by BJP Rajya Sabha MP, Subhash Chandra, went a step ahead to announce how the new Rs 2000 note will have a secret chip, which will help the central government agencies to trace the note even when it was buried under 120 meters.

The theory crafted by Zee News sounded more adventurous than even the makers of James Bond series could ever have come up with. (See below)

Zee News’ Rs 2000 embedded chip theory was widely shared on WhatsApp prompting even some of Modi’s critics to believe it as a real story. But, there was one problem.
The story propogated by Zee News was fake.

This was enough to cause huge social media reactions as users on microblogging site posted funny comments.

Here are some of them:

Courtesy: Janta Ka Reporter

1...2,3802,3812,382...2,697 Page 2,381 of 2,697

Online Petition demands Withdrawal of Charges against Sundar, Prasad and Others

US Presidential Election: Scholars from around the World react

Donald J Trump has declared victory in the US presidential election. The candidate took the stage in New York just before 3am local time to announce that his rival, Hillary Clinton, had called him to concede the race.

A Colossal Calamity, Decreasing Sex Ratio: Supreme Court

Poor implementation of the law against sex selective abortion, the Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act of 1994 remains a pressing problem in the country, ruled the Supreme Court

What agitates Kashmiris & What’s to be done? Fact-finding Report of Concerned Citizens’ Group

1. Excessive use of force by the security forces

2. Use of pellet guns

3. Night-time raids by security forces

4. Misuse of Public Safety Act (PSA)

5. Destruction of electric transformers and crops in rural areas

6. Attacks on Kashmiris outside J&K

REASONS FOR LONG TERM ANGER:

RECOMMENDATIONS: WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE:

Modi Government’s Move Insensitive to Common People, Reveals a Blinkered View of Black Money: Prabhat Patnaik

Demonetization of currency notes by the Modi Govt on November 8

Bar dancers entertain crowd in BJP’s parivartan yatra, flagged off by Amit Shah

Teaching gender inequality in Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka has been lauded for equal access to education for girls and boys, but textbooks and traditions continue to play a role in perpetuating inequitable gender norms and stereotypes.

“Rs 2000 Notes will also have Jio Sim with 4G connection!” What Zee News didn’t report

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