South Asia Citizens Web

Those who killed Salmaan Taseer and those who instigated, justified or celebrated this madness can only be described as religious fanatics, bigoted extremists or intolerant fascists. Those opposing this mindset are often referred to as liberal, progressive, moderate and tolerant. This apparently sharp socio-religious divide seems to be widening rapidly and may well become a battle for Pakistan itself.

With the government at loggerheads with the National Advisory Council and civil society groups on the question of a universal vs targeted approach to the proposed food security Act, Sachin Kumar Jain presents the case against the targeted approach in a country that provides subsidies and exemptions of Rs 418,000 crore to industry while constantly reducing the entitlements of the poor

The International Federation of Journalists has released of a new report in partnership with IFJ affiliate the Federation of Nepali Journalists (FNJ).

Reporting for All: Challenges for the Media in Nepal’s Democratic Transition is the outcome of media monitoring, training workshops and focus group discussions with a wide cross-section of the country’s journalists.

For far too long, the enduring response of the Indian establishment to Hindu nationalists has rarely surpassed mild scorn. Their organised violent eruptions across the country – slaughtering Muslims and Christians, destroying their places of worship, cutting open pregnant wombs – never seemed sufficient enough to the state to cast them as a meaningful threat to India’s national security.

With profound grief and sorrow, we at NFFPFW inform you all about the sad demise of our comrade and fellow traveller Bharati Roy Chowdhury last evening (18 January 2011) at Holy Family Hospital, New Delhi. Bharati had been in the forefront of women’s movements in the country since the 1970s, and also relentlessly fought from the front for the due rights of forest-dependent communities across the country.