South Asia Citizens Web

It is telling that Wall Street, which rarely considers the consequences of gambling on a risk, will not finance the construction of a nuclear plant without a full loan guarantee from the U.S. government. Nuclear power is also uninsurable in the private insurance market. The Price-Anderson Act of 1957 requires taxpayers to cover almost all the cost if a meltdown should occur. No other industry that produces electricity poses such a great national security risk should sabotage or malfunction occur. No other means of generating power can produce such long-lasting catastrophic damage and mayhem from one unpredictable accident. No other form of energy is so loaded with the silent violence of radioactivity.

Scanned version of the original Communist Party Pamphlet from 1947 by Dhanwatri and PC Joshi Excerpt:
"What happened in the Punjab cannot be called a riot. It was a regular war of extermination of the minorities, of the Sikhs and Hindus in Western Punjab and of Muslims in East Punjab. It cannot be compared to Calcutta or Noakhali, Bihar, or even to Rawalpindi for in all these cases it was mobs of one community that took leading part in killing, looting and burning the minority in the area, their communal passions being roused to a pitch of frenzy and savagery.. In the Punjab, however, in the recent biggest killing ever seen, it was the trained bands equipped with firearms and modern weapons that were the main killers, looters and rapers. These were the storm troops of various communal parties such as National Guards of the Muslim League in the Western Punjab, and the Shahidi Dal of the Akalis and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh of the Mahasabha in the Eastern Punjab. They were actively aided and often actually led by the police and the military in committing the worst atrocities."

Organizations represented on the JCI field team were Astitva (Muzaffarnagar), Forum Against Oppression of Women (Mumbai), Humsafar (Lucknow), National Alliance of People’s Movements, Nirantar (Lucknow & New Delhi), Rehnuma-Sanatkada Samajik Pahel (Lucknow), Sahayog (Lucknow), Sama (New Delhi) and Vanangana (Chitrakoot).

India is a secular democratic republic not a military dictatorship. Four anchors of the most prominent English news channels would do well to remember that their collective coverage of the recent incursions in Jammu and Kashmir are irresponsible in as much as they de-link the Army’s actions from the Political leadership of the Centre. In their shortsighted and limited objectives of trying to ‘put the union government in the dock’ at the cost of rational coverage.

11th October: The Justice MB Shah Commission of Inquiry was constituted in 2010 by the Ministry of Mines in response to the growing number of cases of illegal contracting, flouting of royalty payments and encroachment on public lands by large and small scale iron ore and manganese ore mining operations throughout the country. The Commissions’ duration allotted for investigation is coming to a close on 16th October 2013, yet the Commission has not visited three of the states listed in its TOR (Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra, and MP). Having anticipated the dearth of time, Ms Samantha Agarwal of Chhattisgarh Bachao Andolan made numerous inquiries between July and September 2013 to the Commission’s Primary Investigator, Dr. UV Singh on our behalf, and he assured that the commission would definitely complete the investigation. However, on 1st October Ms. Agarwal was informed by Dr. Singh that although the Commission has requested an extension to complete the investigation, the Ministry of Mines has categorically denied its request, thus the MB Shah Commission of Inquiry would no longer be coming to Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh or Maharashtra.