Pooja Mathur set the tone at the meeting held by the Press Club of India, the Delhi Union of Journalists and the Network of Women in Media to protest attacks on women journalists.

Mathur spoke boldly of how she has been targetted by the UP government for her coverage of the bulldozing of a Saharanpur masjid on Sept. 6. Mathur said she was the first to report the demolition on her YouTube channel Red Chili Live. She interviewed the Imam of the mosque and took a video of the rubble. After that she received messages demanding that she delete the videos, followed by threats when she refused. An FIR has been filed against her.

Mathur said courageously, “I was doing my job. I àm not afraid. I will not cry, I will make them cry.” She also pointed out that women journalists like her are the voice and the inspiration of countless other women who dare not step out of home and raise their own voices against oppression.  Mathur also said to the big gathering present, “Do not dismiss us as mere Youtubers. We are serious journalists, we are qualified, we do our research before we go online.”

Divya Srivastava spoke of how she was targetted after she dared to speak at a ‘press conference’ held by UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Sept 12. The CM spoke but took no questions. When Divya loudly called him out, asking him to hear her question, he simply walked away. This smàll incident was blown out of proportion with some fellow journalists warning her to go into hiding as she would now be under fire. She was trolled heavily, with threats, abuse and allegations that she had been sent by a rival political party to ask questions.

“Why should I hide, journalism is not a crime,” Mathur said.

She said her job at a channel was now insecure as the channel owners were afraid of the backlash.

Bindu Romi Gujjar and Monika Singh, both independent journalists based in Delhi, were among the first to reach Balaghat in Madhya Pradesh after several Baiga tribal children died of disease in August 2026. They interviewed parents and relatives of the children.

Gujjar described the trauma of witnessing funeral rites. She said there was only one primary health centre for 25 villages and the nearest hospital is 130 km away. No ambulance is available. She said that the deaths were caused by malaria, a treatable disease. She asked why no malaria vaccines are provided in malaria prone areas. Singh described conditions in the government hospital where three or four children were lying in each bed. The journalists’ documentation of 30 deaths, backed by Aadhar cards and other evidence, embarrassed the local administration which claimed there were only eight deaths. The reporters were shadowed for several days and threatened. The Superintendent of Police wanted them to meet him. They did not go. Two policemen came to their hotel room at 2 a.m. at night, she said. They began to fear for their lives. Eventually they left the hotel in the night and returned to Delhi.

Singh spoke of the conditions in the Baiga villages where there are no facilities, not even clean drinking water. She spoke of the hospital which the District Magistrate, she said, visited several days after the first deaths. She claimed that 34 children were discharged the day before his visit, more beds were supplied, bed linen changed and the entire hospital disinfected. She said the journalists were accused of being Muslim and a doctor at the hospital openly displayed bias.

On Sept 6 the social media accounts of Bindu Gurjar, Lok Singh and Monika were suspended. Monika’s account is still suspended. “We are independent journalists,” she said, “how will we earn and continue to work if accounts are suspended?”

Impassioned testimonies came from Shaheen Khan and Nafeesa Khan of 4 PM News, who were picked up by Saket police on Sept 3, 2026, while standing on the roadside to report the visit of Home Minister Amit Shah and Chief Minister Rekha Gupta to Max Hospital to inaugurate a new wing. Nafeesa described in detail their detention at Saket police station and the trauma of being beaten with fists and a lathi by a woman inspector. She said she began to fear for her life after the inspector learnt they were Muslim and began to beat them more viciously. The SHO, she said, had ordered the beating and other police personnel were complicit.

Shaheen said that after the incident became public senior policemen later apologised and admitted there had been a mistake. However, she said, the FIR eventually registered names of only two police personnel, although they have filed a complaint against several personnel. She urged journalists to take up the issue and ensure justice.

The meeting was also addressed by PCI President Sangeeta Baruah Pisharoty, Secretary General Afzal Imam, DUJ President Sujata Madhok, Divya Arya of the Network of Women Journalists in India, journalist Khushbu Akhtar and Caravan Editor Hartosh Singh Bal who expressed solidarity with the media women and applauded them for their courage in speaking out.

Sabrangindia was among the first to interview both Shaheen and Nafeesa Khan. The interview may be watched here. 

Details of these testimonies by women journalists were released by the Delhi Union of Journalists (DUJ) in a statement, by the organisation’s president, Sujata Madhok and its general secretary, A.M. Jigeesh.

Related:

Press bodies condemn alleged assault on women journalists at Saket Police Station, seek inquiry and action

Two women journalists allege police assault after questioning Delhi CM, say attack intensified after police heard they were Muslim

Two Delhi-based women journalists arrested by Assam police on request from Tripura cops 

The post Women journalists who were attacked prevented from reporting, protest attacks appeared first on SabrangIndia.

On Sept 16, 2026, a young woman reporter Kavita Bishnoi was reportedly threatened by an angry mob of Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) supporters in the Delhi University campus. It was election eve and several reporters were covering the students’ union elections.

Ms Bishnoi has courageously put out a video recounting how a goon came right up to her, yanked at her stole and accused her of being a leftist since her ajrakh scarf had a red border, states the DUJ.

She denied the accusation as did some of her colleagues. She was later accosted again, with two girls demanding to check her mobile phone. She reports that none of the reporters present who saw the mob of over a hundred people armed with sticks and stones were allowed to take photos or videos.

Quoting from Ms Bishnoi’s video, the DUJ statement says that police present on the spot were passive spectators while anyone who dared take pictures were attacked and had their cameras broken. She says that only the fact that she was female saved her from being beaten up.

DUJ regrets the escalation of violence in the city’s once peaceful universities and demands that Delhi police maintain law and order without bias and without infringing on the right of peaceful democratic protest.

Every reporter’s right to freely cover events without undue pressure and every student’s right to vote peacefully must be protected.

The statement has been issued by DUJ president, Sujata Madhok, its vice-president S.K,Pande and general secretary, DUJ, A.M. Jigeesh.

Related:

Attack on journalists in Uttar Pradesh Vidhan Sabha condemned: DUJ

Whither Freedom: The Chhatisgarh attack on journalists

Attack on journalist Nikhil Wagle: Despite evidence, CP, Pune Amitesh Kumar denies attempt to murder charge (S 307)

The post Reporter attacked on DU Campus, DUJ condemns assault appeared first on SabrangIndia.

It’s worth asking because the answer may say less about literature than it does about the way we have learned to read caste. We have, as readers and viewers, built a fairly narrow set of terms under which we are willing to engage with caste at all, and sorrow fits neatly inside those terms. Anger doesn’t.

Sadness is an easier thing to host. A Dalit character suffers, we feel for them, we close the book or leave the theatre a little shaken -quietly proud of ourselves, even, for having felt something at all. It’s a tidy transaction. The pain stays over there, on the page or the screen. We stay over here, safely watching.

But anger doesn’t play by those rules. “Look what was done to me” is a sentence we can pity from a comfortable distance. “You were part of the world that let this happen” is different. It doesn’t ask for our sympathy. It asks what we will do with our discomfort.

Beyond this literary pattern, it played out in real life in July 2016, in a small town called Una in Gujarat. Four Dalit men were skinning a dead cow, their traditional, caste-assigned occupation, when a group of self-declared cow vigilantes accused them of killing it. The men were stripped, tied to a car, and beaten in public with sticks and iron rods while onlookers filmed it. The video spread within hours.

It wasn’t the usual cycle of outrage, sympathy, silence. Thousands of Dalits marched across Gujarat. Tens of thousands eventually joined what came to be called the Dalit Asmita Yatra, the Dalit Pride March. And at the end of it, they didn’t ask to be pitied. They pledged: they would stop removing dead cattle from upper-caste villages altogether. Let the carcasses lie where they fell if no one else would touch them.

That was a refusal. And refusal is harder to watch because it changes the position of the person watching. An entire social order had quietly depended on their silence and that silence had run out.

The instinct to prefer sorrow over refusal has a longer history.

In the 1870s, Jyotirao Phule’s Gulamgiri was asking why a system of oppression had been built in the first place. Later, Dalit writers and theorists would continue to challenge the expectation that Dalit lives should appear on the page primarily through suffering.

The same discomfort appears in the Marathi film Fandry. Jabya, the protagonist, spends the story being humiliated, and the audience is given every reason to feel for him. Then, in the final shot, he picks up a stone and throws it straight at the camera- straight at the viewer. He is no longer simply someone to pity; he is someone looking back. It is harder to sit with than anything that came before it.

That moment matters because the viewer can no longer remain comfortably outside the scene. The stone crosses the invisible distance between the character and the audience.

None of this makes Dalit anger the “right” emotion, any more than suffering ever was. The ask is simple: let people be whatever they actually are, on the page and off it. Let them suffer if that’s true. Let them refuse, the way Una refused, if that’s true too. Nobody should have to stay pitiable to be taken seriously.

Maybe that’s the real thing being asked of all of us: not compassion, which is easy to hand out and feel good about, but the willingness to face Dalit anger without demanding that it make us comfortable. Some voices were never meant to comfort us. They were meant to make us listen.

(The author is a postgraduate student of English Literature with interests in Dalit studies, South Asian Literature, media, cultural identity and representation based in Bengaluru.)

Related:

Thirty years on, justice remains elusive for Dalits in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Haryana

Dalit Justice Demanded: CJP exposes 30 brutal anti-Dalits atrocities, urges NCSC to confront nationwide caste violence under Article 338

No to Dalits who are Christian, Muslim, how the AP HC limits its understanding of caste and faith

The post Outside the World, Outside the Page: Why We Are More Receptive to Dalit Suffering than Dalit Anger appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Stating that they are deeply dismayed at the recent reports of large scale, state driven deforestation due to diversion of forestlands for developmental projects, the open letter cites a July 2026, reply of the Minister of State for Environment, Forest and Climate Change in response to a Parliament question. Further, the communication states that, in the five years from 2014–15 to 2018–19, a total of 74,705.68 ha of forestland was approved for diversion. In the next five-year period from 2019–20 to 2023–24, this increased, by nearly 29 per cent, to 96,112.90 hectares. If the current pace continues, forest land diversion during the next five years is likely to exceed 110,000 hectares. Besides, the increase in deforestation is most evident in the ecologically sensitive Himalayan and North Eastern states, in Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, etc. And many other proposals are in the offing, the most appalling of them being the cutting down of nearly a million trees, over 13000 hectares of rainforest in Great Nicobar Island.

The communication also emphasises that, the compensatory afforestation that is expected to be undertaken for the diversion of these forest areas is either not undertaken or if undertaken is almost never successful. The proposals are also, often, ludicrous, e.g. taking up compensatory afforestation for the rainforests of Great Nicobar in dry Haryana, 4500 km away.

Within this alarming trend, of particular concern is the fact that lands within National Parks and Wildlife Sanctuaries. I.e. Protected Areas (PAs) along with their Eco-Sensitive Zones (ESZs) are also being diverted at an alarming pace. Proposals to divert lands inside PAs require the approval of the Standing Committee of the National Board of Wildlife (SC-NBWL), a statutory body   tasked with promotion, conservation and development of wildlife and their habitats. However, it is seen that 97% of the diversion proposals placed before the SC-NBWL since 2014 have been cleared.  In just four meetings held in 2024 and 2025, as much as 5824 ha of land inside PAs and ESZs have been cleared for non-forest use with as many as 100 plus proposals getting cleared in almost every meeting.  The diversions permitted were for industrial parks, quarrying, mobile towers, tunnels, oil refineries, railway lines, synthetic organic chemical manufacturing unit, petrochemical park, temples, helipads, mining, hotels, apartment complexes, oil drilling, etc. – entities which in no way benefit wildlife and their habitats. More worryingly, an increasing trend of diversions is noted in Protected Area clearances with every passing year: from 91 projects within Protected Areas granted clearance in 2019, the number steadily increased to 378 in 2024 and 312 in 2025.  PAs make up only 5.4% of the geographic area of the country and the headwaters of many rivers originate in these PAs, providing water and ecological security to the country.  Fragmentation of forests and wildlife habitat drastically reduces the ability of these areas to perform their vital role as a green lung for the country.

How did this happen

The implementation of infrastructure development, mining, etc. through diversion of forests and Protected Areas, has been possible due to the weakening of environment and conservation laws by the government as well as through judicial rulings.  For instance, the Forest Conservation Amendment Act 2023, has   redefined forests in a way that leaves out huge tracts of forested land from legal protection and allows easy diversion of such lands.

Projects which have gone ahead without obtaining the mandatory forest clearances as required under law are being regularised on payment of nominal fines, or by the ridiculous requirement that the violator undertake three to five times penal compensatory afforestation. This is totally antithetical to environmental jurisprudence which directs that EIAs should be done prior to commencement of the project and the diversion of forest and other lands, and not as a fait accompli after the project has started.   After the Forest Conservation Act of 1980 was amended and the Van (Sanrakshan Evam Samvardhan) Adhiniyam or the Forest Conservation Amendment Act came into being in 2023, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change  has, in just two years (2024–25 and 2025–26), already approved the diversion, for non-forestry purposes, approximately 22562 ha of forestland per year , as compared to an average of 19223 hectares per year during the five year period 2019 – 24, and 14941 hectares  per year for the preceding  five year period.

The letter also contends that, the SC-NBWL, which is constituted of mainly top government officials, unfortunately, “seems to have no hesitation in approving almost all the diversion proposals placed before it.  It is particularly condemnable that in the past decade more than 30 wildlife sanctuaries and National Parks have been de-notified or drastically reduced in area to enable easy diversions of their land for “developmental” projects.  This includes the Megapode Wildlife Sanctuary as well as the Galathea Bay Wildlife Sanctuary in Great Nicobar, despite the latter being India’s most important and the northern Indian Ocean’s largest nesting site for endangered giant leatherback turtles.”

The recent Supreme Court ruling in July 2026 stating that post-facto environmental clearances (ECs) are legally acceptable if they are authorised by a post-facto valid statutory notification under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986, does nothing to improve matters, permitting the central government to regularise violations under Section 3 of the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986.  The Court effectively replaces the ’precautionary principle’ (preventing harm) while dealing with India’s environment with a “pollute and pay” model.  Entrepreneurs can construct big-ticket projects without taking any of the mandatory prior clearances, present the government with a fait accompli and simply pay compensation to stay operational.

Every day brings a new, foolhardy proposal to reduce forested and wildlife protected areas. One such is the recent proposal of the Assam Government to reduce the Eco-sensitive zone (ESZ) of the iconic Kaziranga National Park from 10 Kms to 1 km and allow brick kilns, stone crushers, hotels, commercial warehouses, etc., to operate much closer to the park boundary. It does not apparently matter that the rhinoceros population will be severely and adversely affected. Another such proposal is the use of 12.6 hectares of the Delhi Ridge for the President’s Bodyguard parade ground, which, if implemented, will further fragment the already degraded ridge in Delhi which serves as a green lung for the metropolis.

Do highways mean growth?

The recent push for “development” arises from a misguided understanding that roads, infrastructure, mines, etc. will ensure the growth of the country. There is no realisation that an unpolluted environment together with extensive forest cover and thriving wildlife is even more important for human well-being. Recently issued environmental, forest and wildlife laws, rules and office orders along with “development friendly” judicial rulings have weakened the earlier strong environmental and conservation approach of the country.

The over 700 signatories state that while they acknowledge that infrastructure development projects are necessary for the country, but they should not come at the cost of ecological security. This can only imperil the country as evident from the massive landslides, mudslides, alarming AQI’s, heat waves, deluges, floods, and other environmental calamities occurring across the country. Such a prioritisation is against all aspects of the “precautionary principle” and “intergeneration equity” enunciated by the Supreme Court, as well as being in contravention of Articles 48 A and 51 A of the Constitution and most importantly of Article 21, the Right to Life.

Finally, the communication urges both the government and the judiciary to prioritise the ecological security of our country and the health and life of its citizens over the false narrative of more roads, more buildings, more townships, more mines, more industries, and more destruction of the natural world that is currently seen as progress.

Constitutional Conduct Group (77 signatories as below)

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The post Prioritise ecological security of country over “false narrative” of “highway development”: CCG to Govt & Courts appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The advise offered by Dhirendra Krishna Shastri (Parchiwale baba, whom Prime Minister Modi calls his younger brother) in this regard, evoked reactions in fish and meat-eating West Bengal. The state is on the eve of celebrating its biggest festival, Durga Puja. The BJP swept to power in in West Bengal in early-mid 2026. Even before this, the visibility of BJP’s political assertion in the state has been accompanied by promotion of Lord Ram (over Maa Kaali/Durga). This is a move which had previously yielded rich electoral dividends for it in North India, also affecting the electoral scenario in India as a whole.

As the BJP government settled in to ‘governance’ in the state, the season for the annual Durga Puja came. And the party in power invited Shastri of Bageshwar Dham as its passport to vegetarianism. This was a testing tactic, a well-honed technique tried by the far right sangh parivar, to test its schemes before an all-out imposition.  He visited West Bengal for a ‘Hanuman Katha’ in Howrah’s Liluah. He advised the people to keep non-vegetarian food away from Durga idols during the Puja. Similar advice was already proffered by the RSS affiliate, the Viswa Hindu Parishad (VHP). This triggered a storm among Bengali Hindus, including those calling themselves “Hindu nationalists”. There were statements and protests from prominent Bengalis that Shastri should not teach them how to celebrate Durga Puja and what to eat and what not.

The reaction was due to the fact that fish in particular but goat-meat too, during the Durga festival are almost mandatory to the menu. Many of them underlined that fish is very crucial to Bengali culture and the broad umbrella of Hindu religion has many tendencies where non-vegetarian food is part of the ritual. Many from former Tripura Governor Tathagata Roy to journalists and content creators, people from a diverse section, including those who described themselves as “Bengali Hindu nationalists”, retaliated. “Don’t tell a Bengali how to celebrate Durga Puja,” Kolkata-based content creator Shreyasi Biswas Banerjee wrote on Facebook. In the video (link attached), Biswas underlined that an “outsider” was prescribing rules for a festival embedded in Bengal’s distinct religious and culinary traditions. A few people even tore down posters of Shastri.

Suvendu Adhikari who had earlier received Shastri with great warmth thereafter attended a ceremony at a Durga temple and was seen consuming ‘Fish Prasad.’ A clear mitigatory gesture! Many right-wing sympathisers and detractors even stated that the core value of fish in Bengali culture.

India is a country full of diversities in all matters, food, clothing, language and religion. Hindus also have many sects and many diverse food habits. We have Kashmiri Pandits for whom Mutton dishes are as an inalienable part of their culture. The food habits are decided by multiple factors, geographical location being an important part of that. In Coastal areas, sea food is an important part of their diet.

However, the ruling regime has persisted this vegetarian imposition.

In the recently held BRICS meeting, in the Gala dinner (mid-September 2026), only vegetarian food was served. Indecently Xi Jing Ping skipped this dinner, whatever be his reasons! While serving only vegetarian food for international guests was criticised by the opposition parties, Kiran Rijiju, the minister and loyal handyman of the most powerful in the government, defended it by saying that the guests appreciated the menu.

The Uttar Pradesh (UP) Government (its chief minister is Yogi Adityanath) recently published a map of important food items of all districts of UP. In this culinary map, the much loved and savoured Lucknow’s Tunde kabab was missing!! Only vegetarian items were presented, as if UP consumes only the vegetarian food.

In yet another incident 14 Muslims were put behind the bars (some months ago) for having chicken biryani at their private Iftar party on a boat ride in Ganga River. Interestingly some Hindus who consumed liquor during another private boat ride were left un-policed.

Despite knowing the fact that nearly 70% of Indians are non-vegetarians, vegetarianism is being promoted by the BJP Governments, and at some places successfully. In Gujarat where BJP has been in power for the past three decades, non-vegetarian joints have been selectively invisibilised. Many people go to the restaurants near Gujarat border and satisfy their craving for non-vegetarian food.

This remains a dilemma for the majoritarian BJP: a balancing act between Indian’s prevalent food habits and their agenda of imposing vegetarianism. At every possible chance they and their cohorts try to push forward vegetarianism. Somehow BJP associates’ non-vegetarianism with Muslims (and Christians) in particular, never mind what history tells us about the food habits of early India. This bypassing of non-vegetarian food, an essential part of Indian food habits, irrespective of religion of the people is facing this dilemma. They get away with this aggressive vegetarianism in places like in Gujarat, however in WB, they are facing an opposition.

Human society has evolved through various stages, and food habits have always been very diverse. The aim of RSS-BJP and their political-cultural supporters remains to glorify vegetarianism purely for ideological reasons. There may be some other reasons for promoting Veganism or vegetarianism, but respect for people’s food habits is the starting point for a democratic society.

How much does this regime believe in democracy is free for all to see.

Related:

Non veg food ‘ban’: Student group plans protest at Delhi’s Hansraj College

Most Indians Non Vegetarian; Men More Than Women, South & East Most

Can majoritarian societal pressure re-write the rulebook? The illegality behind forced non-veg shutdowns during festivals

The post Politics through a forced imposition of food habits appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Paper leaks are often treated as an examination problem. For the students involved, it becomes a much bigger problem. A cancelled examination can mean starting preparation again, spending more money, travelling again and waiting months for another opportunity. For candidates close to the age limit, a delay can even affect their eligibility for another attempt.

The scale of the problem has been visible in some of India’s biggest examinations. The NEET UG 2024 controversy brought the issue into the national spotlight. The Central Bureau of Investigation investigated allegations surrounding the leakage of the examination paper in Hazaribagh, Jharkhand. The controversy also raised questions about grace marks, examination centres and the overall conduct of the examination.

Government recruitment examinations have faced similar controversies. In 2024, allegations of a question paper leak affected the Bihar Public Service Commission’s teacher recruitment examination, with the commission cancelling the examination for candidates at one centre in Patna. Such cases show how a problem at one point in the examination system can affect thousands of young people waiting for a fair chance.

Think about an aspirant who has spent two years preparing for a government examination. They may have left a job, joined a coaching programme, borrowed money for preparation or moved to another city. On the morning of the examination, they are ready to finally see the result of that effort. Later, news breaks that the paper was leaked and the examination may have to be cancelled. For the authorities, it becomes an investigation. For the student, it can feel like another year has disappeared.

There is also a financial cost that rarely gets enough attention. Application fees, coaching, books, online courses, accommodation, travel and repeated preparation all add up. Not every aspirant comes from a family that can comfortably afford another attempt. A student from a financially weaker background may have to choose between preparing again and finding work to support the family.

Then comes the question of trust. The basic idea behind a competitive examination is simple: candidates should receive the same paper under the same conditions and compete on their preparation. If some candidates get access to the paper beforehand, that basic understanding of fairness breaks down. Students begin wondering whether hard work is enough or whether connections and money matter more.

This is especially serious in India because government jobs remain highly sought after by young people. They offer stability, regular income and social security at a time when many private sector jobs can be uncertain. A limited number of vacancies can attract a huge number of applicants. When an examination is cancelled or delayed, the competition does not disappear. It simply becomes another round of waiting for the same young people.

The responsibility for protecting an examination cannot be placed on students. They have already done their part by studying and appearing for the test. Examination agencies need stronger security systems, careful handling of question papers, better monitoring and quick action when irregularities are reported. Investigations also need to reach the people responsible instead of leaving students to carry the consequences.

There also needs to be greater transparency after a suspected leak. Students deserve to know what happened, why an examination was cancelled and when the next examination will take place. Recruitment calendars should be as predictable as possible, especially when thousands of young people plan their lives around them.

A paper leak may look like a few pages reaching the wrong hands. For a student, the loss can be much larger. It can mean lost time, lost money, another year of preparation and another period of uncertainty.

India often speaks about merit and equal opportunity. Those words only have meaning when the system protects the people who earn their place through honest effort. Young people preparing for examinations are not asking for an easier competition. They are asking for a fair one.

The exam leak crisis is therefore more than a problem of examination security. It is a youth issue. Every leaked paper raises the same question: when the system fails, who pays the price? Too often, it is the student who studied honestly.

 (Jyotiraditya Singh is a Youth Leader and Social Activist associated with Youth Forum India. He writes on youth, education, employment and public policy issues, with a focus on giving young people a stronger voice in public conversations.)

The post The youth caught in the exam leak crisis appeared first on SabrangIndia.

They discuss the meaning of words like “mastermind”, the uneven nature of the fight against state power, and why the struggle for justice and democracy must continue.

Watch the full conversation.

The post “If I Believe in Democracy, How Can I Give Up Hope?”| Umar Khalid: 2,190 Days | Banojyotsna | Teesta appeared first on SabrangIndia.

I see the same image now at a university bathroom on the corridor of the English Department, which exists to fight the very social evils that exist a few feet away from our cushioned seats of discussion. We discuss Ambedkar, and dignified labour, and then leave students to the cafeteria and teachers to their cabins in staffrooms, our break-spaces. The space the akkas receive? The bathroom floor.

Talking with a classmate who frequently interacts with the akkas, I came to know that the akkas have a designated breakroom—in the basement, far from their actual spaces of work which they need to get back to every hour. The inconvenient spacing of these break rooms, unlike the considerate accommodations students and teachers often receive, forces them to remain in the bathrooms no matter the situation. During our conversation, my classmate referred to an incident where she saw one of the akkas resting because she had a cold—by lying down on the bathroom floor.

These images, as I reflected on them, reminded me of a Dalit child made to sit on the floor while their upper-caste peers peered down at them from their benches. Space was made for individuals based on their caste. While the bathroom space of rest is not enforced the same as untouchability in schools, its logic of space has trickled down into urban institutions and spaces years after the abolition of untouchability through Article 17 in 1950.

Most of the individuals working in sanitation, and cleaning belong to the Dalit community, owing to their historic oppression and social exclusion that suppressed them into spheres of work deemed undignified or polluting for the upper class. The most adverse form of this reflected in India is manual scavenging. The workers are defined by The Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013 as those “engaged or employed by an individual or a local authority or an agency or a contractor for manually cleaning, carrying, disposing off, or otherwise handling in any manner human excreta…”

Despite the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013, the Safai Karamchari Andolan (SKA) estimates around 1,726 worker deaths from manual scavenging since the 2013 law. The law has not prevented the continued employment of Indian citizens in such undignified jobs based on their caste. Their systematic exclusion from higher education, and jobs beyond the brooms and mops, through threats of violence, denial and lack of pay forces them back into their caste-assigned jobs. The Safai Karamchari Andolan further estimates that among the 1.2 million sanitation workers in India, over 90% of them are Dalits.

While legally and in terms of overt oppression, workers in the housekeeping force may not be the same as manual scavengers, the occupation is a sanitised offspring of the same, which many individuals of the Dalit community are a part of owing to their historic social and economic exclusion.

The logic of a lack of spatial dignity in urban spaces for the cleaning staff contains an invisible residue of these exclusionary practices that has become normalised. This exclusion might not exist out of active caste discrimination—though it is an active practice in certain spaces. We see an institutional negligence that many spaces have arrived at that mimic the logic of a historical exclusion—here the basement and the bathroom. One must question if the normalisation of this historic exclusion has contributed to the lack of creation of dignified spaces of rest for these women. A room exists, but for whose dignity and convenience?

Now, not only has it been normalised in the minds of us privileged beneficiaries of their work, but it has also been systematically normalised in the minds of the victims through repeated practice.

A video circulating on Instagram, by the creator ‘Akash_swaroopa_,’ records him bringing in two of the housekeeping staff at a school to celebrate them. Two chairs have been set up for them at the front of the room but one of the women instinctively takes a seat on the floor before they are guided to the chairs. This instinct is a corporeal manifestation of the spatial trauma that has been ingrained into the daily lives of the workers.

These workers are often thanked and even celebrated with special days at universities and other spaces to acknowledge their work. However, that celebration of the individual becomes null and hypocritical when their work environment is undignified. No number of balloons and speeches of appreciation, while they are important, can substitute for chairs, or a convenient break room that restores dignity in everyday working conditions.

I, and others, often find ourselves touching bathroom doors with tissue paper and stepping carefully on the bathroom floor. Yet, the very spot that we are loathe to stand on is the very spot where these individuals, worthy of the break-spaces we receive, sit. It is a haunting thought to think as I sit on a cushioned chair in a Dalit Studies classroom, a few metres away from a woman who sits on the bathroom floor, just next to her disinfectants.

(The author is a Masters student of English Literature focusing on dalit studies, gender, culture and media studies based in Bangalore)

Related:

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Lucknow: Caste hierarchies & contract labour exploitation among sanitation workers

ASHA workers, Anganwadi workers and sanitation workers overlooked in India’s healthcare protection reforms

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At the time of these killings in 1999, Dara Singh was an active member of the Bajrang Dal (BD) and the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP), had campaigned for the Bharatiya Janata Party in the 1998 elections, and regularly attended Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) camps and rallies. He was also a central figure in the vigilante band of Bajrang Dal’s cow-protection campaign, which in his hands took the form of ambushing trucks driven by Muslim cattle traders, intercepting the vehicles, freeing the cattle, and setting the trucks ablaze.

In this detailed background piece to the whole controversy, Citizens for Justice and Peace, had, on July 22, 2026, elaborated the sequence of events. The article may be read here. It was advocate Vishnu Shankar Jain who filed a plea in the Supreme Court seeking Singh’s remission of sentence and release, in which he had argued that Dara Singh met the state government’s criteria for granting remission (i.e. 25 years). Claiming that the burning alive of Graham Staines and his two minor sons was on account of “youthful rage” (Singh was 37 years old at the time of his arrest), the Odisha State Sentence Review Board had also recommended his release from jail on ground of “good behaviour.” Thereafter, on July 14, 2026, a bench comprising of Justices Manoj Misra and Vijay Bishnoi of the Supreme Court through its order had asked the Odisha Government to take a decision on the premature release of Singh by August 19. The decision was only relayed yesterday, however.

Interesting developments, as reported by The Hindu, led to this turnaround by the authorities in Odisha. The newspaper reported that, “The Kendujhar district authority on August 28, 2026, have reported that on August 15, 2026, a congregation comprising approximately 200-250 persons associated with Dara Sena assembled in front of the District Jail, Kendujhar in connection with the proposed release of the convict, during which provocative slogans were reportedly raised,” says the proceeding copy of SSRB’s August 31, 2026, meeting.

The piece by CJP traced the three cases that Dara Singh was involved in before the killing of Staines and his two sons (January 1999). Dara Singh was also convicted for beating and burning to death Shaikh Rahaman, a Muslim garment trader. In the same year, he led the mob that hunted down and killed Arul Das, a Catholic priest, with an arrow as the priest fled a church his attackers had set alight.  Singh had been also implicated in the killing of Shaikh Imam, a Muslim cattle-truck driver’s assistant, who was beaten to death in September 1998 after his truck was looted and set on fire. Singh was acquitted in that case in 2006 for want of sufficient evidence.

Given the widespread national and international outcry, the 1999 murders hled to a CBI’s investigation after which, 14 adults including Singh, were put to trial, along with one minor who was tried in Juvenile Court. In September 2003, the Sessions Judge convicted all the accused for life imprisonment but sentenced Dara Singh to death. On appeal in 2005, the Orissa High Court commuted Dara Singh’s death sentence to life imprisonment. Thereafter, in its judgment on January 21, 2011, the Supreme Court of India upheld the High Court’s decision. The judgment notes that,

“In the case on hand, though Graham Staines and his two minor sons were burnt to death while they were sleeping inside a station wagon at Manoharpur, the intention was to teach a lesson to Graham Staines about his religious activities, namely, converting poor tribals to Christianity. All these aspects have been correctly appreciated by the High Court and modified the sentence of death into life imprisonment with which we concur.” (Para 43). The Court upheld the commuted the death sentence to life only because it did not meet the ‘rarest of rare’ threshold for capital punishment.

Related:

Dara Singh, convicted in string of 1999 communal killings, likely set for release by August 15

Odisha: Graham Staines’ Brutal Murder; Mystery Hangs Over Dara Singh’s Release

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What led to the violent disruption of the reading circle on August 27 at the AUDA Garden in Vastrapur this year? Was it just the two books – ‘I Am Malala’ and ‘Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl’ that provoked the violent mob led by the Bajrang Dal? Or was this part of a much larger pattern of violence in the Hindu version of Taliban where everything – from books, clothes, food, to films, comedy and protests – offends them?

More troubling is the role of a section of parents who brought in Bajrang Dal elements to “solve” their issues with the school management. Why would they willingly invite extremist hindutva elements into a school their wards studied in? While they sought to force changes in curriculum and administration, did these parents think that bringing in goons was the best way to do so?   

How it all started

The genesis of the reading circle was the decision of the Anand Niketan School, a private upmarket school in Ahmedabad to remove the books – the memoirs of Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani education activist and Nobel Peace Prize winner and the diary of the German Jew and holocaust victim Anne Frank from its reading list after protests from a section of parents and right-wing groups.

But even before the books became the target of these parents and their rightwing supporters, a food safety issue at the school had pitted parents against the school administration. On August 12, a piece of glass was found in the canteen food, and the school authorities, rushed to get the student X-rayed to assure his parents that it was not swallowed.

The angry parents did not trust the report and soon the issue escalated. Other, unconfirmed reports said that a student had found worms in vegetables and   parents protested about eggs being cooked in the school canteen.

Target of Attack Shifted From Food to Books

The parents then chose to target a Muslim curriculum consultant who had been associated with the school for several years. They objected to the books ‘I Am Malala’ and ‘The Diary of a Young Girl’ being on the optional reading list. According to reports, some parents called Bajrang Dal members to fight the school administration on their behalf and on Aug 14, a mob led by Bajrang Dal leader Hiren Rabari climbed the gate and the boundary wall of the school to demand the removal of the books from the curriculum.

The issue snowballed from then on and the school administration decided to remove the books as well as terminate the contract of the consultant.

A young businessman in the city found the controversy over the books troubling and wanted to organise a silent reading in protest. He reached out to core members of the Students and Youth Collective (SYCA), Ahmedabad, and the collective co-organised the reading.

Violent Disruption of a Peaceful Reading

 The reading went on peacefully from 4 p.m. to about 6:15 p.m. at a park near the DEO office in Vastrapur. Around 6:30, as the group was dispersing, about 40 men entered the park shouting “Jai Shree Ram” and carrying thick wooden sticks, metal rods and baseball bats. Some wore saffron scarves. They had left more sticks outside the park, near the entrance.

Their body language was aggressive from the start, and the first thing they objected to was I Am Malala, though we also had books on Sardar Patel, Gandhi, Nehru and Ambedkar. They shouted, “Kya bola tha Malala ne Kashmir ke baare mein?” and “Usko padhne wale desh drohi hain.”

I was standing a little behind the group, filming. Two of them were staring at me, and I asked, “Kya hai, ghoor kyun rahe ho?” They said, “Tujhe dikkat hai to bahar chali ja, humein jo karna hai hum karenge.” Another said, “Zyada bolegi to pakad lo isko.” A second woman who was recording was told, “Kal tak gayab kar denge tujhe.” The man who appeared to be leading the mob gave his name: Hiren Rabari.

I could see this would turn violent quickly. A call was made to the police helpline. Some people tried to sit the men down and talk calmly, but they had no interest in a dialogue. To buy time, some of the readers began singing the national anthem; the attackers objected to that too, claiming one person’s shoulders had moved and that this was disrespect!

Then they began pushing and beating people. They shouted, “Inke pant utar ke check karo ye Musalman hai ki nahin.” Two or three ran towards the gate and tried to shut it so no one could come in to help. I ran over and stood there so they could not, shouting, “Aapki private property nahi hai ye, jo darwaza band kar sakte ho.”

By then, they were chasing people down the street in separate groups. It was about 7 p.m., peak office hours, and the street was full of people walking and riding two-wheelers. Residents of Casa Vyoma, the society directly opposite the park, were also watching.

Despite telling the police that the mob had assembled in large numbers, only two policemen arrived in a van — one in uniform, the driver in casuals. When the officer in uniform tried to stop the assault, the attackers beat him too, in front of everyone. No one watching said or did anything.

A man came up asking questions, giving the impression that he might be able to help. In my panic, I told him we had been reading books silently and that Bajrang Dal goons had come and started hitting us. He immediately began shouting, “Aeee, gunda kisko bola?” I said, “Jo dande leke aayega aur pitai karega wo gunda hi hai,” and he turned aggressive himself, advancing on me and repeating the question multiple times.

Another woman was hit with a stick. I saw that a friend was being beaten and ran towards him. By then, the police officer was panicking and instructing us to get into the van. We tried, but the attackers kept pulling my friends back out and slapping them. Both policemen looked badly shaken. “Kaise bhi jaldi baitho van mein, hum tumhe police station le ja rahe hain. Yahan ruke to ye log tumhe maar dalenge,” they said.

We reached Vastrapur police station. Others arrived with the books, and with sticks left behind in the park to show both the range of what we had been reading and the weapons used. We gathered in one room and began explaining the sequence of events. The PI, G M Chaudhary, spoke to us but did not pay attention to the details.

She watched some of the videos we had taken and asked the writer to record our statement, who wrote a single summary paragraph that left out everything specific. Seeing this, we said we would give a written complaint instead of an oral one. Some lawyers and senior activists had reached the station by then. We went over the draft several times, since each detail could determine a corresponding criminal charge.

We gave Hiren Rabari’s name. We had also identified some other attackers by matching our videos to their Instagram accounts — after Bajrang Dal Gujarat’s official account posted a video of the attack, boasting that they had taught us a lesson in their own language. The algorithm began pushing similar accounts to us, and we identified another attacker as Jimit Rabari.

The police brought three young attackers to the station, and they sat in the same space as us, quite casually. Soon, more of them began arriving, as though they were sitting in a park. It was very intimidating and triggering. We recognised at least 20 to 25 of their faces from the park. Two or three senior Bajrang Dal men came to the station and spoke to the PI for a long time behind a closed door.

Unlike the businessman, who had protested for the first time in his life, perhaps the rest of us did not look gullible. The PI shrewdly took him aside, recorded his statement — which again left out crucial details from our written complaint — and persuaded him to sign it. The rest of us, the primary complainants, witnesses and informants, were left out of the FIR process without our consent.

The PI kept saying she would match the details later, that she needed to eat, that she wanted to go home. We left the station at 2:15 a.m. The FIR, without the details we had been promised, was uploaded at 3 a.m., and, based on the messages we received in response, all three of those arrested were released at the same time.

No arrests, no further police action against the mob

There have been no arrests since. We filed an additional complaint setting out the differences between our written complaint and the FIR, had it inwarded from the DCP office and met the DCP Harshadkumar Patel, who said action would be taken within a week. Nothing followed. We were attacked on 27th August. On 31st, we held a press conference demanding the arrest of the two primary accused, Hiren Rabari and Jimit Rabari, within 72 hours; a ban on Bajrang Dal in Gujarat and across India; and a response and apology from Home Minister Harsh Sanghvi for failing to protect us and to deliver justice.

Twenty days on, we are still waiting. We hold responsible not only Bajrang Dal, the state government and the police — for a grave violation of our safety, for rioting, and inciting religious violence — but also the section of Anand Niketan parents and the people on the street, who have let Gujarat become a factory of hate and crime over the decades. These elements have given complete impunity to state-sponsored terrorism and culture wars.

These are the people who countenance violence against Muslims and Dalits every Navratri, or behave with cowardice and hypocrisy even when their own friends are attacked by saffron-clad men. These are the Brahmin and Jain men who eat meat in private while the administrators of their children’s school claim “all the students are strictly vegetarian.” They laugh at cheap jokes on caste, gender and class. They laugh at pronouns and the Palestinian flag and blame reservation for everything.

However, there is a pushback. The reading circle itself had emerged as a coming together of two groups -one led by students and the other, by working professionals – who were undoubtedly part of privileged castes and classes and would have been otherwise invested in the status quo of a post-2002 pogrom model of a “rising” Gujarat.

What follows now is a contest between the collusion of these elite hate mongers and the persistence of not-so-privileged young people who refuse to be cowed by political and social violence. We won’t be silenced!

*(The writer, who prefers to remain anonymous, was a participant in the reading circle and a witness to the violent mob’s disruption of it.)

Courtesy: Free Speech Collective

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