South Asia Citizens Web

Recently (December 2011) M.P. Government’s Gau-Vansh Vadh Pratishedh (Sanshodhan) Act (Bill for Protection of Cow Progeny) got the Presidential clearance. As per this act punishment for slaughtering the cow or its progeny, transporting them to slaughter house, eating and storing beef, is punishable with a fine of R 5000 and prison term up to seven years. States like Gujarat, Karnataka, Jharkhand and Himachal Pradesh already have laws against cow slaughter, while Orissa and Andhra Pradesh permit the killing of cattle other than cows if the animals are not fit for any other purpose.

Soni Sori, an adivasi school teacher and warden from Chhattisgarh, is currently facing trial in Chhattisgarh. 200 citizens including eminent citizens and 69 civil society groups and organisations have written to the supreme court of India to protect ’to insulate this victim of
custodial sexual assault from her oppressors, ensure her protection after she has spoken out about this torture despite threats to her person and family’

The month of January [2012] has been a nose dive for the civil liberties in the country. First, some social sites have got court notice for hosting content that the government and some petty groups deem objectionable. Secondly Author of book Satanic Verse, Salman Rushdie was told informally by the government that as some people are objecting to his visit to his home country, therefore he should cancel his visit to the Jaipur Literary Festival.

The time has come for Indian secular-democrats to assert the case for a better universe: a universe built around citizenship and rights, not the pernicious identity politics the state and its holy allies encourage.

In Rushdie’s Haroun and the Sea of Stories, Iff tells Haroun how certain things are P2C2E, (process-too-complicated-to-explain). But this process is simple: politicians and clerics gain by keeping the population uninformed. They fight chimeric battles and offer illusory benefits to Muslims, who want education and jobs. Instead they get quotas, and not skills, with the added bonus: to protest Rushdie.