South Asia Citizens Web

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Mangalorean, 8 August 2010
Karnataka doubles temple grants By Team Mangalorean Bangalore
BANGALORE, August 2, 2010: In an attempt to fill the agenda set by the ruling BJP, Karnataka’s Home Minister V S Acharya, who also holds the Religious Endowment portfolio, said the government increased annual grants (tastik) to 3,600 temples in the State from Rs. 6,000 to Rs. 12,000 to enable priests meet daily pooja expenses.
The increase in the grants would cost Rs. 58 crore to the State (…)

This 54-page report documents the continued use of the archaic practice and the continued reliance on the "results" by many defense counsel and courts. The practice, described in outdated medical jurisprudence textbooks used by many doctors, lawyers, and judges, involves a doctor inserting fingers in a rape victim’s vagina to determine the presence or absence of the hymen and the so-called "laxity" of the vagina. These findings perpetuate false and damaging stereotypes of rape survivors as "loose" women. Defense attorneys use the findings to challenge the credibility, character, and the lack of consent of the survivors.

LOOKING at the pace of the investigations and the reluctance of the powers that be to the investigations into the Samjhauta Express bombing, the first terror attack on the trans-border train between India and Pakistan, have remained inconclusive so far.

The question as to what might have happened if Pakistan had stayed on the secular path lies in the realm of conjecture and Muslims are told to avoid speculation. But one thing is clear — the quest for a theocratic dispensation is bound to cause Pakistan harm one is afraid to imagine. History records only one outcome when religion is used to resist an oppressed people’s nationalism. As a Dhaka editor told Ayub Khan in 1965, "the more of a religious polity you talk of, the smaller will become the size of Pakistan you will be left with". His diagnosis was confirmed in 1971.

Instead of calling on the youth to stop violence, New Delhi should unilaterally release all the Kashmiris from detention, set up a transparent justice commission on the lines of the “Truth and Justice Commission” of South Africa and request the people of Kashmir to come forward, appoint several task forces to address all the political, social and economic issues that have been agitating the minds of the people. These should be done in an open and transparent manner throughout the Valley. The task forces must be empowered not only to make recommendations but to implement their recommendations. As these task forces will begin to meet and discuss all issues in an open manner with the people in the districts and tehsils we will perhaps begin to see the contours of a solution emerging from the darkness that engulfs the region of Kashmir today. This will go a long way in establishing trust and substantive democracy in Kashmir. But the question is: Is anyone in New Delhi listening?