'The Telangana police are working on the same agenda against Muslims as the Modi government at the Centre.'
In Nagpur Central Jail's 'Anda Cell' languishes a 90% disabled, ailing, professor, sentenced to life imprisonment for Maoist links.
'This is how Narendra Modi-Amit Shah rule. They are now announcing that these arrested Naxalites want to kill Modi.'
Neerja Pandey's Baby, one must say, wouldn't have been as interesting without the lead troika.
'Adivasis are a critical national treasure, so we need to protect them.' 'The fight for the tribals of Chhattisgarh needs people from all political parties. It cannot be about any single political group.'
'Under the guise of Maoism, the State is presently determined to clear out the whole Bastar area of its tribal population.'
'Akhilesh's plan is simple.' 'He wants to lead the party on the strength of the infrastructural development his government has done, capitalise on the massive sympathy wave of young people in the state who dream of doing what he has managed to do -- defy a feudal, greying orthodoxy that occupies and sits on posts and positions never to leave.'
As Indrani, Sanjeev Khanna and Peter pass cupboard no 6 -- where the skull is stored -- what thoughts pass through their mind?
Pasbola wound up his cross examination, tabling a new narrative in the murder case. That Sheena Bora had been murdered not by her mother. But by her brother.
All 12 convicts found guilty in the case relating to the July 11, 2006 serial train blasts, which claimed 188 lives in local trains in Mumbai, have pleaded leniency in the court on the point of sentence citing humanitarian grounds.
Sukh Ram and Raja were charged with corruption during their tenure as telecom ministers. Sukh Ram was convicted while Raja has been acquitted. One had cash found under his bed; in the case of the other the trial judge mockingly asks: Where is the money? And if there's no money, where is the corruption? So, pronounced innocent. Sukh Ram is a Brahmin. 'Maybe he strayed just that one time, people like that aren't usually corrupt.' And Raja is a Dalit. 'Can you expect any better?' What race is in some places, caste is in India, says Shekhar Gupta.
The National Human Rights Commission will look into cases of communal riots in Muzaffarnagar once the situation returns to normal, NHRC Chairperson K G Balakrishnan said.
The babas' vote banks and the politicians' greed for en bloc votes, is the curse of Punjab and Haryana.
Two custodial deaths in the last 10 days in Meghalaya's Garo Hills have triggered a wave of public protests in the northeast. Human rights bodies have demanded an immediate judicial inquiry into the incidents.
'I got to know the men accused of the blasts regularly meeting them in court and jail. Some of them, like Dutt, are back in jail. Others, like Mohammed Jindran, a quiet and well spoken middle class man, were killed. And now of course Yakub is ready to be hanged. The first in the case to do so,' says Aakar Patel.
'What I remember best is the vigour with which she threw herself into the job, the passion she had for issues, particularly those that affected the poor.'
'Who is the right Mekhail? Mekhail I or Mekhail II?'
'He has not done any harm to anyone. Yet you give him life imprisonment.' 'We were told to respect the Constitution. That is what Sai is doing; he is not doing anything beyond the Constitution.'
Under threat from the Maoists, and jailed by the police, AAP's Soni Sori plunges into the election for all she holds dear. Aman Sethi reports
There it lay, a photograph on the desk under a stapler, and later a stamp pad, forgotten, done with, like its subject, a Mumbai Metro One employee who vanished overnight.
So concluded a day in court that saw a woman accused of murder don a fresh role of heroine of the moment. Even Bollywood couldn't have come up with such a curious twist.
Indrani's words were quick, her hand gestures quicker. She kept pointing to certain paragraphs in their consent terms.
'At the back of the courtroom the three accused sat trying to catch the drift and fathom the new, inexplicable turn the case could be taking.' 'And the consequences it might have on their lives.'
'In the districts of Jagdalpur and Dantewada, the only time the accused walked out of jail was when they were acquitted. There is no concept of bail.' 'The women were very clear -- they had to fight. Remaining silent any longer was not an option.'
'With folded hands, on humanitarian grounds, if she can get temporary bail on medical grounds so she can get treatment.' 'If she dies, the whole trial gets derailed.'
'If 25 black men had been executed illegally in the US in one day, the government would have fallen and the population would have rallied to the victims. In India, those of us who did not applaud the police only yawned,' says Aakar Patel.
'It is perhaps kind of easy to see why Peter and the police clash.' 'The obvious air of entitlement that emanates from him, maybe unknowingly, probably gets the goat of the policemen.'
The roots of the cancellation of 2G telecom spectrum licences and coal blocks lie in two non-profit organisations - Common Cause and CPIL.
'That winsome smile is a key asset. And says a lot about her too.'
'I ask for bail in the name of justice.' 'Give me a chance to stay alive and see the trial till its end.'
In the witness box, on bald embarrassing display, was not just Sub-Inspector Ganesh Dalvi, but the entire system of police investigation too.
Tuesday was the last that Courtroom 51 saw of Shyamvar Rai, accused No 3 and approver in the Sheena Bora murder trial. True to form, Rai's final hours in the witness box were rather acrimonious. His cross-examination at several points turned downright ugly.
The attempts to unearth the document started getting more and more frantic. The clerks began to flip pages of files full of documents, some hand written, some bearing thick seals or multiple stamps, some in Hindi, some in Marathi. Several junior lawyers joined in, perusing different files and dockets. But in spite of the best of efforts the document was not to be found.
'Sridhar had the ability to paint a vision, for an activist faced with the toughest personal problems so as to see a way out by combining one's personal desires with the needs of the movement.' Arun Ferreira remembers his fallen comrade Sridhar Srinivasan.
'This is not the handiwork of ordinary sub inspectors and constables.' 'If the police claim there was a scuffle between them and these five men, then how come none of the policemen were killed, or even hit by a bullet?'
Rediff.com's Prasanna D Zore reports from Bhopal and Manikhedi Kot, Etkhedi Kot and Kejra Dev, about the October 30-31 escape and encounter in which 8 prisoners were killed, a case that has many questions and few answers.
'People are beaten at the slightest provocation, paraded completely naked and then tortured. Did you know the number of prison deaths is the highest in Maharashtra? The one year I was in jail, 98 prisoners died.' 'The judges did warn the jail authorities, but they didn't care. They even violated the high court's order regarding my treatment. One judge asked my lawyer: "Can I go and implement my orders there?"' Professor G N Saibaba, who is 90 per cent handicapped, speaks of his ordeal in a Nagpur jail after being arrested for protesting against the Centre's anti-Naxal and anti-Adivasi campaign.
The curative petition and other legal remedies still available to Yakub Memon are part of his rights as a prisoner condemned to death. Does the Maharashtra government want to deprive him of these rights, asks Jyoti Punwani.
Right from the beginning, the State abdicated its responsibility in fixing the blame for the Hashimpura massacres or getting justice for the victims.
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