A Delhi court on Thursday directed the Central Bureau of Investigation to withdraw a lookout circular issued against the chair of Amnesty International India Board Aakar Patel in a case of an alleged violation of the Foreign Contributions Regulation Act and apologise to him.
'To love all Indians is to love India in reality.' 'To love the lines on a map is to love a symbol,' says Aakar Patel.
If the Congress recovers some of its earlier influence among the Dalits, the BJP will be in a quandary since the Dalits were among the party's latest acquisitions. To lose them will be a disaster for the saffron camp not only in UP, but all over India, observes Amulya Ganguli.
'Today, the State is permanently going after politicians, but also civil society, academics and all those it is threatened by or irritated with.'
'The attack prima facie constitutes an act of cyber-terrorism,' the petition stated, 'that has several grave political and security ramifications, especially considering that the devices of government ministers, senior political figures and Constitutional functionaries which may contain sensitive information have been targeted.'
'In a part of the world where the government tells people what not to eat and what slogans to shout and not shout, it is beneficial to develop a mentality that is science minded and therefore open-minded.' 'That is possibly why the space programme has always had support from all sides of the political divide,' says Aakar Patel.
'It is only because of the Congress that we became a secular republic.' 'As we enter a period where another political force has became dominant, it will be interesting to see if this legacy of Nehru and the Congress is sustained or we are taken in a new direction,' says Aakar Patel.
What has changed to make our team so much more lethal, asks Aakar Patel.
'The BJP has the opportunity to undo a lot of the damage that we have suffered as a society which looks away from mass violence.'
'If Indians are as smart as their counterparts in university, and have equal opportunity, then what is the reason that we cannot produce inventions of quality that are recognised by the world?'
The government could look at providing deductions for expenses incurred by salaried employees while working from home in the upcoming Budget as it looks to boost demand, consulting firm PwC India said on Thursday. Addressing a pre-Budget session, Pwc India senior tax partner Rahul Garg said demand creation is particularly focussed on money being given or left in the hands of the individuals.
'The phone numbers of over 40 Indian journalists appear on a leaked list of potential targets for surveillance, and forensic tests have confirmed that some of them were successfully snooped upon by an unidentified agency using Pegasus spyware,' report Anuj Srivas and Kabir Agarwal in The Wire.
The government and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party have dismissed the Pegasus Project reports as concocted and evidence-less.
This film is creating waves. We tell you why.
The analysis showed that two backups of the iPhone 6s belonging to Wilson had digital traces showing infection by the Pegasus surveillance tool, which its developer, the Israeli cybersecurity firm NSO Group, has said has been licensed only to government agencies.
Pegasus, which is capable of attacking both Android and iOS, has been around for three years and is considered one of the most sophisticated spyware in the market.
Generations of Indians don't quite grasp that there would barely be an India had it not been for the Sardar whose steadfastness and guile stitched together that which had been united only in philosophy and spirituality and sometimes not even then -- for thousands of years. A fascinating excerpt from Hindol Sengupta's The Man Who Saved India, Sardar Patel and His Idea of India.
Parvez was arrested on September 16 and placed in administrative detention in a jail in Kupwara for allegedly posing an imminent threat of breach of peace.
'We have had 27 years of liberalisation and in the same period Korea and Japan and China transformed themselves forever,' says Aakar Patel.
'What is the problem in getting the UK to extradite our citizens?' asks Aakar Patel.
The Wire has reported that phone numbers of multiple people close to Dubai Princess Sheikha Latifa, who was captured by Indian soldiers in 2018, were added to a list of potential targets for surveillance.
The deported Rohingyas would face persecution in Myanmar but also, possibly, elimination.
The government, however, dismissed allegations of any kind of surveillance on its part on specific people, saying it 'has no concrete basis or truth associated with it whatsoever'.
However, it was not clear on what basis most of the people were being held.
Unless Indians learn to speak freely and fearlessly, 'true greatness will elude this nation, no matter how brilliant the individual at the helm may be,' says Aakar Patel.
Counsels for AgustaWestland VVIP chopper scam accused Christian Michel and fugitive diamantaire Nirav Modi were also the potential targets of Israeli spyware Pegasus.
The apex court, which dismissed the review pleas filed by three of the four death row convicts of the sensational December 16, 2012 Nirbhaya gangrape and murder case, said the courts cannot be held for committing any illegality in awarding capital punishment in "appropriate cases" till death penalty remains in the penal code.
Here's a recap of the events from the past 24 hours.
'We can make all the noise we want to about being a tolerant society, but the reality is in front of us.'
Here's a recap of the events from the past 24 hours.
Sher Shah Suri ruled for only a few years, but his huge influence on India continues six centuries later, reveals Farhat Nasreen.
"It is essential that your administration and Government of India cooperate to ensure that those accused of causing Bhopal disaster, including UCC, are made to face trial and that Bhopal survivors are able to obtain redress," Larry Cox, executive director of Amnesty International USA said in a letter to the President.
'It would have been much more appropriate if a law such as this, which all of the civilised world has given up, was struck down through democratic politics rather than five individuals sitting in judgement,' says Aakar Patel.
The amnesty scheme is a 'practical and pragmatic' approach to bring back the black money stashed abroad, the chairman of Assocham's Legal Affairs Council R K Handoo said on the sidelines of the release of a study on black money in New Delhi on Friday.
'Many already toe the line, those on the fence will be nudged to stand with the government even more, those who are critical will face trouble soon.'
Former internationals Rohan Gavaskar, Deep Dasgupta and Hemang Badani are among 101 cricketers who have severed links with the rebel Indian Cricket League and applied to the Board of Control for Cricket in India to return to the fold under the amnesty scheme that ended May 31. Seventy-nine current and 11 former Test cricketers -- including ex-captain Ajit Wadekar and off-spin legend Erapalli Prasanna -- have taken advantage of the amnesty scheme.
'As a great democracy, we must be responsible and uphold the rights of those who come to us seeking shelter.' 'Everything in the Hindu faith tells us that this is obligatory on us,' says Aakar Patel.
'The problem of a Hindu rashtra is that it has no text which can be adapted to the modern world.' 'The most prominent element of the Hindu way of organising society and the State is through caste.' 'This is not acceptable to most Hindus.' 'Because a Hindu rashtra also erodes the power and the rights of the majority of Hindus, we can be assured that this is not something that the BJP, or any other force can do,' argues Aakar Patel.
'There is a discomfort among many of us at the fact that the Republic is not more Hindu than it could or should be.' 'This discomfort is producing laws such as the one we now have in Gujarat,' says Aakar Patel.
The report reveals that the inaction of the West Bengal state government, including tacit acceptance of the violent operations of the armed supporters of the CPI-M, resulted in serious human rights abuses, including unlawful killings, abductions, sexual assault of women and forced eviction and displacement of thousands of people in 2007.
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