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UN committee flags caste, tribal and minority concerns in India

Persistent caste discrimination , the marginalisation of Dalits , concerns over the rights of Indigenous and Tribal Peoples , and the treatment of religious and ethnic minorities are among the issues flagged by the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) in its latest observations on India.
Recent posts

No commitment on watershed ban, no timeline: NAPi tears into FSSAI's response on junk food ads

  The advocacy group Nutrition Advocacy for Public Interest (NAPi) has rejected as inadequate and evasive the response it received from the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) to its August demand for a ban on junk food advertising , saying the government's reply sidesteps every substantive demand raised by the country's leading doctors and public health experts.

The donation trail: From American schools to churches and temples

  The other day, I was talking with a non-resident Indian (NRI) in a middle-level city off the eastern coast of the United States. The tête-à-tête took place as we were returning from a religious ceremony at a well-established Hindu temple, where several hundred NRIs had participated, many of them actively.

'Women's rights under coordinated attack': India among countries facing persistent legal gaps

The latest update to Equality Now's flagship Words & Deeds report reveals that women's and girls' rights globally are facing a "strategic and coordinated rollback," with hard-won legal protections being weakened or deliberately undermined, though the report stresses this backlash is neither inevitable nor irreversible .

Climate disruption is here—but most companies still can't measure the damage

  A comprehensive new study from the Capgemini Research Institute paints a troubling picture of corporate climate readiness, revealing that while executives increasingly recognize climate change as a material business threat, most organizations lack the fundamental capabilities to measure, manage, and adapt to its impacts.

Study traces rise of Sankalp Bhoomi as Gujarat's Ambedkarite public space

A new academic study has drawn fresh attention to Sankalp Bhoomi, a modest memorial site in Vadodara's Sayaji Baug, arguing that the spot where B.R. Ambedkar spent five difficult hours in 1917 has quietly grown into one of Gujarat's most significant sites of Dalit political and cultural assertion.

Swaminarayan, untouchability and the 'we are not Hindu' argument

  Following my blog on why the Eiffel Tower authorities should take all the blame for giving in to the Swaminarayan sadhus ’ bizarre demand to “invisibilise” women, including its female staff, during their visit to the internationally renowned Paris tourist centre on September 5, an interesting comment by one of the top academics drew my attention to something I vaguely knew about one of India’s most powerful and richest religious sects.