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Showing posts from October, 2021

Known to have assissinated O'Dwyer, Udham Singh chose not to apologise to the British

Udham Singh (26 December 1899 – 31 July 1940), best known for assassinating Michael O'Dwyer , the former lieutenant governor of the Punjab in India , on 13 March 1940, done in revenge for the Jallianwala Bagh massacre in Amritsar in 1919, for which O'Dwyer was responsible, was subsequently tried and convicted of murder and hanged in July 1940. While in custody, he used the name Ram Mohammad Singh Azad, which represents the three major religions of India and his anti-colonial sentiment. Writes a well-known analyst, "He too could have apologised. He chose the noose instead!" Udham Singh's speech prior to sentencing in UK: *** “I say down with British Imperialism. You say India do not have peace. We have only slavery Generations of so called civilisation has brought us everything filthy and degenerating. known to the human race. All you have to do is read your own history. If you have any human decency about you, you should die with shame. The brutality and blood

The employment challenge: Public policies for livelihood adequacy, security

By Dr Kamal Nayan Kabra* Basic Issue: Growth sans employment is travesty of development Fair, remunerative, assured (that is continuing over a reasonable length of time such that cannot be terminated arbitrarily ) provision of opportunities to the adults to earn their livelihoods to sustain themselves and their families by contributing to the national/ social production process may be considered a reasonable description of what is mean by employment generation. This participation in the social labour process enables one to discharge her/his role as a social human being by participation in the social/national market economy. Hence widely prevalent/observed inability /failure to provide employment, as described above, to a varying, often large, part of their labour force, is among the seminal, historically observed and presently prevalent systemic characteristics of the modern market economies, including India. Experience has shown that many counties adopt measures to go in for the growt

Farewell sermon of Prophet: Justice, peace, forgiveness, women’s rights

Inscription proclaiming Muhammad as the messenger of God By Moin Qazi As you read these lines, 1.6 billion Muslims across the world, from Morocco toIndonesia, will be paying homage to the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) on his birthday (18th October). This day, 1,431 years ago, Prophet Muhammad(PBUH) delivered the historic Last Sermon (khutabat al-wida) on the parched terrain of Mount of Mercy (Jabal ar-Rahmah) in the Uranah valley of Mount Arafat, 20 kilometres east of Mecca in Saudi Arabia. It was precisely on the ninth day of Dhu al-Hijjah(12th and last month of the Islamic year -6 March 632)) in the tenth year of hijrah(migration from Mecca to Medina) that the Prophet addressed 1,44,000 pilgrims The sermon, though seemingly addressed to a Muslim gathering, had a universal message. It consists of summarized exhortations based on some core teachings of the Qur’an and Sunnah (Prophetic practices). It captures the ethos of Islam and provides a great lens for viewing the religion. Some of his a

Jal Satyagraha, Matri Sadan and a way forward to water justice

By Mansee Bal Bhargava* There are currently more than 300 plus international transboundary water conflicts between the sovereign borders and if cumulated and accounted for, there are thousands of inter-state and inter-district transboundary water conflicts within nation states. The hydro-diplomacy in those conflicts is pretty much between the national and state/district governments respectively. Besides this, there are innumerable conflicts that occur between the citizens and the government/s transcending the geo-political boundaries and scale of water; when the government pretends to be more powerful than the citizens and when the citizens presume their right to rise for the various social-ecological aspects of water. This is when citizens chose the path of Jal Satyagraha (as in India) as a peaceful and non-violent means to dissent against a policy/project or set of those. There are innumerable community led water campaigns/protests/movements alias Jal Satyagraha currently ongoing aro

International Energy Agency floats new plan to end oil, gas, and coal expansion

In major shift, International Energy Agency (IEA)’s World Energy Outlook has mainstreamed 1.5°C pathway, showing need to end oil, gas, and coal expansion, insisting on new fossil fuel phase-out benchmarks in order to test government ambition ahead of COP26. A report by Oil Change International, distributed by BankTrack: *** For the first time, the International Energy Agency (IEA)’s flagship annual report on global energy pathways, used worldwide to influence trillions of dollars in investment, details an achievable roadmap to keep global heating below 1.5 degrees Celsius (°C). By making a 1.5°C scenario the benchmark of this year’s World Energy Outlook (WEO), the IEA challenges governments and companies to back up lagging Paris pledges with immediate action to shift the energy system away from fossil fuels. Notably, this year’s WEO solidifies the policy conclusion, first presented by the IEA in May , that no new oil, gas, and coal extraction projects should be approved under a 1.5°C-

CIC seeks disclosure of Kashmir Operations 1947-48 files held by Nehru museum

By Venkatesh Nayak*  Readers may recall my despatch from two years ago about my efforts to seek access to the papers handed over by General Sir Roy Bucher to the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library (popularly known as Teen Murti Library) containing details of the operations launched by Indian Defence Forces in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) soon after the erstwhile princely State acceded to India on 26-27 October 1947. Both the Central Public Information Officer (CPIO) and the First Appellate Authority (FAA) had refused to disclose those papers under The Right to Information Act, 2005 (RTI Act) claiming that the Union Ministry of External Affair s (MEA) had prohibited disclosure to researchers. 18 months after the matter was escalated to the Central Information Commission (CIC) by way of a second appeal, the CIC has now favoured the disclosure of the Sir Roy Bucher papers on J&K, in the national interest, directing NMML to obtain the necessary permissions from MEA. The Background Rea