South Asia Citizens Web

India, its Constitution asserts, is a socialist republic. Nobody loses sleep over that huge joke. The Constitution also claims India to be a secular republic. It is however a soft variety of secularism, the republic is secular to the extent ‘practical’ politics permits it to be so. Not merely that those who claim to defend the Constitution lack the courage of their conviction, the conviction itself, have no illusion, is greatly wobbly.

Pakistan’s supreme court has begun hearing challenges to a legal amnesty for senior politicians and has issued an order annuling the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO)

Full text of the affidavit filed by senior advocate Prashant Bhushan in response to the notice of contempt issued by the Supreme Court of India for his interview to the Tehelka news magazine levelling corruption charges against judges.

For the last few weeks Humanists, Rationalists and Human Rights activists have been waging a huge battle against the forces of fundamentalism in Andhra Pradesh. This is a battle where all sections of society, and in which the media, the police, the justice system, aggressive fundamentalists, the Dalai Lama as well as the Humanists and Rationalists are involved. It is a battle that is being watched with keen interest by millions of homes as it unfolds on live TV and through public (…)

We put on record, our strong apprehensions that the proposed Apprehensions about the Proposed Civil Nuclear Liability [Cap] Bill is meant to open the Indian nuclear market for the US companies at the cost of the potential Indian victims of an accident, which by definition can neither be predicted nor completely avoided, and common Indian taxpayers.