South Asia Citizens Web

PUDR welcomes the bail granted by the Supreme Court to Sunil s/o Satpal and Kanwaljeet Singh, two of the Maruti workers on February 23, 2015. Sunil and Kanwaljeet are among the 147 workers who were arrested in the aftermath of the violence on July 18, 2012, in the Manesar plant of Maruti Suzuki in Haryana which led to the death of the factory’s HR manager Awaneesh Kumar Deb. However it is hardly a cause for celebration given that the bail was long overdue, and the other 145 workers still continue to languish in jail.

Nepalese Supreme Court gave landmark judgement that serious crimes should not be the subject of Amnesty and declared ultra vires a several provisions of - Commission on Disappearance and Truth and Reconciliation Commission Act.

Senior diplomats, parliamentarians, policy-makers and journalists from Pakistan and India met for the fourth round of the Track-II Islamabad Dialogue to discuss the state of bilateral relations, ahead of the much anticipated meeting between the Foreign Secretaries of the two countries on March 3. The dialogue was organised by Jinnah Institute and the Centre for Dialogue and Reconciliation

The government’s promise of ‘poverty elimination’ comes with an across-the-board reduction in government expenditure on social protection and social security. The funds allocated for the MGNREGA are frozen at Rs. 34,000 crores and have for the first time come to below 2 percent of government expenditure. Expenditure on health, education, women and child development, both rural and urban housing, drinking water and sanitation, and welfare of SCs, STs and minorities all taken together have faced cuts amounting to 1 percent of the total budgeted expenditure or nearly Rs. 10,000 crores.

Selected editorials and commentary in the Bangladesh media on the hacking to death of author and blogger Avijit Roy