South Asia Citizens Web

“It is deceitful to describe pellet guns as ’non lethal’. While they may not kill, they have maimed people permanently, specially by causing loss of vision. Breaking up a public gathering by blinding those in it is inhuman. Tear gas is at least as effective and does no long term damage.”

The brutal murder of the Kannada scholar Dr. M. M. Kalburgi in August last year had resulted in a sharp reaction from Indian intellectuals, literary scholars and artists. Earlier rationalist Dr. Narendra Dabholkar was killed in Pune and Comrade Govind Pansare in Kolhapur in Maharashtra. Reacting to these attacks on intellectuals, several artists and writers had returned their awards to the awarding bodies as a way of protest.

Recordings of TV discussions in India following discources of Jain Religious monk in the Haryana Assembly

Interviews and recording with IWA veterans - The IWA was nationally acclaimed for its campaigns to protect the rights of the early immigrant workers setting in the UK in the 50s and 60s and its tireless work against discrimination and injustice. It acted as a training nursery for a generation of Asian and Black community leaders, inspiring many into mainstream local and national politics in the UK

Undoubtedly, there is a quarter that wants to project our polity as one that is predisposed to becoming a wellspring of violence, unless it is somehow suitably moulded and rounded-up to accommodate and live with modernity. This quarter would like others to believe that the so-called religiously motivated extremist groups are trying to redefine the concept of “nation state”.