South Asia Citizens Web

Victims and survivors of the Bhopal gas tragedy have extended their support to Pakistani teenager Malala Yousufzai who has stood up for women’s education.

my friend was mad once
and he said what have they done
to my painting, this
is not mine anymore, why
do you want to poison me and my painting
you will murder me, I know
where is the night, I want to sit by the shore
eat one last meal, and walk into the sea

They just can’t say it straight, our blessed holy fathers, champions of righteousness and clear winners of an international hypocrisy prize if one was on offer. On supposed insults to the faith, insults real or imagined, their fists go up and angry foam flecks their outraged lips. Rallies are mounted across the country and the pillars of the republic, far from sturdy at the best of times, are shaken. But come a Taliban-staged event like the shooting of Malala and tongues begin to twist, churning out a fog of doubt-laced ambiguity. To every crocodile tear shed is added a comparison with drone strikes and the American war in Afghanistan.

We are extremely concerned that from 15 October 2012 the Australian Prime Minister will visit India to discuss selling Australian uranium. Our Prime Minister is breaking a long held policy by negotiating sales deals with your country which has nuclear weapons but refuses to be part of relevant international treaties. We commit to redoubling our efforts to stop uranium mining so that poison from our country will not contaminate your sea, your water, your food chain and your gene pool.

Rather than treat opposition to nuclear power for its hazards as natural, logical and an indication of citizens’ engagement with the world, [India’s] Department of Atomic Energy and its subsidiary Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd see dementia in it—a pathological condition to be cured by psychiatrists to be especially invited from the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences, Bangalore. The government has all along demonised the Koodankulam project’s opponents. Prime Minister and the Home Minister, no less, vilified them as inspired by “foreign-funded” NGOs without an iota of evidence or taking action against them for such offences as they might have committed in diverting overseas funds meant for other uses.