2010

Schools are meant for play and studies where kids slowly blossom into adolescents.
Schools are meant for books, laboratories and other cultural activities which cater to the all- round development of its inhabitants.
Schools are meant for the opening up of minds, inculcating inquisitiveness and curiosity, explaining the wonder that is the world and leading the students towards further enquiries and promoting inclusiveness cutting across different ascriptive categories with (…)

The CIA is funding the operation of a secret 3000-strong Afghan paramilitary army whose principal objective is to assassinate the Taliban and Al-Qaeda operatives not just in Afghanistan but also in adjoining Pakistan’s tribal areas across the border. This has been brought out in sharp relief in Bob Woodward’s recently published absorbing but sensational book, Obama’s Wars. This operation bears striking resemblance with the covert assassination drive against the Al-Qaeda in Iraq; this helped (…)

The Ayodhya judgment of the Allahabad High Court has relied on a Report, submitted to the High Court in 2003, by the Archaeological Survey of India after its excavations on the site, as ordered by the Court. As citizens of India, or persons of Indian origin, or friends of India, we demand that this Report should be published forthwith and be available for scrutiny in the public domain, especially to scholars, as it is now a part of the public judicial record.
We learn that two (…)

While the three-hour spell-binding opening ceremony of the Commonwealth Games before a packed Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in the Capital on October 3 has warmed the hearts of every spectator, what was most noteworthy was the rousing applause with which the 60,000-strong crowd greeted the Pakistani participants in the Games—after the Indian team the biggest round of applause was reserved for them. This was fresh reflection of the importance of sports in breaking down artificial barriers raised (…)

In the times of recession Obama claims to fulfill his promise to withdraw troops from Iraq. His military man in Afghanistan, Petraeus, is formulating a programme to withdraw from Afghanistan next year. Obama himself has announced steps to deal with the economy at home. He has unveiled an infrastructure programme of $ 50 billion to get more jobs for the American labour by investing in railways, roadways and airways and help middle class business with tax cuts.
If seen in the context of the (…)

In case of Santa Clara County versus Southern Pacific Railroad, Justice Morrison Remick Waite of the US Supreme Court, without hearing the argument pronounced that
The court does not wish to hear the argument on the question of whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of the opinion that it does.
Summary record of (…)

FROM N.C.’S WRITINGS
The government introduces a bill in Parliament without bothering to enforce the whip on its supporters to be present in the House. Equally shocking is the conduct of the Opposition which, while claiming to be the largest party in Parliament, goes back on its own word without the least scruple and does not vote for the amendment that earlier on the very same day it promised to support. And this was followed by a sordid exhibition of exchange of abuses, in which the (…)

I
Like many others who have made comment on the verdict of the Allahabad High Court on the several suits pertaining to title over the disputed site in Ayodhya, I also have available to me only the excerpts of the operative parts of the judgement(s) that have seen print thus far.
Having read these with care, and repeatedly, alongwith most commentaries that have appeared, and listened with despair to the many debates on the electronic channels, after some excruciating hours of (…)

The following is the response of Dr John Dayal, Secretary-General, All India Christian Council, to the Ayodhya judgment on September 30, 2010.
The judgment of the Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High court today on the Babri Masjid-Ram Janmabhoomi dispute is patently based on populist and political sensitivities, rather than on points of law. The judges have given a legal cloak to popular Hindu mythology that the Lord Rama was born at the very spot where the mosque was built over the ruins (…)

The PDF file extracts from which are reproduced below can be had at http://rjbm.nic.in/. It is the “Judgment delivered by Hon’ble Dharam Veer Sharma, J”.
It does not seem to me that elaborate comment is needed on the evident scheming, on the confounding of plaintiff and judge, and on the crafty intertwining of historical fact and mere belief. The treatment of limitation and of adverse possession is elegantly simple: chit main jeeta, pat tu hara. When Law does not help, make Deities pile (…)