e - Clarion Of Dalit

Honor Civil Rights of Indians

2012-01-26T08:11:00.000-08:00

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Working For The Rights & Survival Of The Oppressed

Editor: NAGARAJA.M.R… VOL.6 issue. 5…… 01/02/2012

“There is a higher court than the court of justice and that is the court of conscience It supercedes all other courts. ”
- Mahatma Gandhi

Editorial : Honor Civil Rights of Citizens of India

The indian public servants must learn to respect Fundamental rights , Human Rights of Indian Citizens. They must allow the citizens to perform their fundamental duties without hindrance. Hoping that this awareness will dawn on Indian public servants , wishing all my fellow Indians on 63rd Republic Day. Jai Hind. Vande Mataram.

Your's Sincerely,

Nagaraja .M.R.

Are Wars Inevitable?
By William T. Hathaway

"We've always had wars. Humans are a warring species. Without an army to defend us, someone will always try to conquer us."
These assumptions have become axioms of our culture. They generate despair but also a certain comfort because they relieve us of the responsibility to change.
Some politicians and pundits declare that human nature makes peace impossible, that war is built into our genes. They point to research by evolutionary biologists that indicates our closest genetic relatives, the chimpanzees, make war. Therefore war must be part of our heredity.
It's true that in certain situations chimpanzees do raid neighboring colonies and kill other chimps. Those studies on killer apes got enormous publicity because they implied that war is hardwired into human nature. Most scientists didn't draw those conclusions from the evidence, but the mass media kept reinforcing that message.
Further research, however, led to a key discovery: The chimps who invaded their neighbors were suffering from shrinking territory and food sources. They were struggling for survival. Groups with adequate resources didn't raid other colonies. The aggression wasn't a behavioral constant but was caused by the stress they were under. Their genes gave them the capacity for violence, but the stress factor had to be there to trigger it into combat. This new research showed that war is not inevitable but rather a function of the stress a society is under. Our biological nature doesn't force us to war, it just gives us the potential for it. Without stress to provoke it, violence can remain one of the many unexpressed capacities our human evolution has given us. Studies by professors Douglas Fry, Frans de Waal, and Robert Sapolsky present the evidence for this.
Militarists point to history and say it's just one war after another. But that's the history only of our patriarchal civilization. The early matriarchal civilization of south-eastern Europe enjoyed centuries of peace. UCLA anthropologist Marija Gimbutas describes the archeological research in The Civilization of the Goddess. No trace of warfare has been found in excavations of the Minoan, Harappa, and Caral cultures. Many of the Pacific islands were pacifistic. The ancient Vedic civilization of India had meditation techniques that preserved the peace, and those are being revived today to reduce stress in society: www.permanentpeace.org.
Our society, though, has a deeply entrenched assumption that stress is essential to life. Many of our social and economic structures are based on conflict. Capitalism's need for continually expanding profits generates stress in all of us. We've been indoctrinated to think this is normal and natural, but it's really pathological. It damages life in ways we can barely perceive because they're so built into us.
We don't have to live this way. We can reduce the stress humanity suffers under. We can create a society that meets human needs and distributes the world's resources more evenly. We can live at peace with one another. But that's going to take basic changes.
These changes threaten the power holders of our society. Since capitalism is a predatory social and economic system, predatory personalities rise to power. They view the world through a lens of aggression. But it's not merely a view. They really are surrounded by enemies. So they believe this false axiom they are propagating that wars are inevitable.
In the past their predecessors defended their power by propagating other nonsense: kings had a divine right to rule over us, Blacks were inferior to Whites, women should obey men. We've outgrown those humbugs, and we can outgrow this one.

Hunger Is A ‘Weapon of Mass Destruction’, Says Jean Ziegler
By Siv O'Neall

"Every five seconds, a child under 10 dies of hunger. – Thirty-five million people die each year from hunger or its immediate aftermath. – One billion people are permanently and severely malnourished and the situation is becoming increasingly catastrophic." (Jean Ziegler)

In his latest book “Mass Destruction – the Geopolitics of Hunger”, Jean Ziegler[1] talks about the current state of the world and the neoliberal politics of starvation of the poor, which has led to a crisis situation amounting to calculated murder. What we are witnessing today is the worst hunger crisis in human history is. And it is all because of human greed, colossal mismanagement for profit.
Professor Ziegler deals in detail with the various causes of the current worldwide hunger disaster, which could have been avoided. This crisis is not determined by fate – or, to use Ziegler’s own word – ‘La famine n’est pas une fatalité’. The world could perfectly well provide food for 12 million people, almost the double of the present population of 7 million.
So what made this murderous situation possible where thousands of people are dying (37,000 every day) from lack of food and clean water? La famine n’est pas une fatalité. It could have been avoided. It should not be happening.
The agroindustry is killing off small farmers – some countries are fighting back
The goals of the ‘cold monsters’ (les monstres froids) of the agroindustry, Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), Cargill and Bunge, et al. is to suck the life out of small farmers all over the world, especially in Africa and southern Asia.
The exceptional development that is taking place today in Latin America is liberating it from the grip of neoliberalism. This can only emphasize the point that the horrible famine that is seen in Africa and south Asia should never have happened. Latin America is forcefully fighting against dependency on the International Monetary Fund (IMF), The World Bank and the World Trade Organization (WTO) – the three horsemen of the Apocalypse, in Jean Ziegler’s own words.
Redistribution of land from large estates with huge tracts of uncultivated areas to small farmers has proven extremely effective in raising the standard of living, in helping the poorest of the poor in several Latin American countries. These countries have wrenched themselves free from the killer treaties like NAFTA, CAFTA and FTAA[2], created exclusively for rich North America to take over the natural resources in the southern hemisphere.
The United States is intimately tied in with the Transnational Corporations (TNC) and they are firmly determined to end up owning the world. The way they proceed is to first take over the valuable commodities everywhere, in Latin America as well as in Africa and now also in India. Let us not forget that Latin America used to be quite naturally counted on as the backyard of the U.S. The leftist liberation movements to the south of its borders have been a bad blow to the deeply rooted feelings of superiority and selfrighteousness that Americans have always taken for granted.
Latin American countries have now created trade treaties of their own, like MERCOSUR and ALBA. However, It remains to be seen how well MERCOSUR will be able to stand up to U.S. imperialism.
Organized hunger has been made the order of the day, without any visible protest
It was done step by step, in the deepest secrecy, since the Main-Stream Media (MSM) did not even touch on the subject, if they knew about it at all. And all the time we were thinking: ‘There must be a way back. This can not go on.’ And then it went on. And it got worse. And worse.
The transnational corporations essentially own the western governments and they are running the world for the profit of their own cabal, and for profit alone.
The small farmers, the subsistence farmers who produced enough food to provide for their families and for selling at the market for a modest income, are being ruined, by careful planning.
The Three Horsemen of the Apocalypse of organized hunger, the supra-state organizations IMF, The World Bank and the WTO carry out the wishes of the major food companies. The major three are Cargill, Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) and Bunge. These cold monsters are able to fix the prices of food through the powers they have given themselves as cartels or monopolies.
The small farmers in Africa and elsewhere needed help to go on with their hard work to support their families and to produce food for the country. Droughts, military conflicts, political crises, natural catastrophes, man-made emergency situations, all these contributed to recurrent food crises.
IMF was ready to extend big loans, BUT with strings attached. Structural adjustment programs would follow and the people were the victims.[3] There was now less money for the governments to spend on education, health care, food aid to the desperately poor, infrastructure – and the list goes on. Unemployment and poverty increased and new loans were needed, if only to pay off the interest on the old loans to the tiger sharks, ‘les requins tigres’ – Jean Ziegler’s term. Now the third world countries are enslaved in a vicious spiral of debts.

There is of course also disastrous corruption among the leaders of the countries in need that prevents the money from many well-intentioned NGOs from getting into the right hands.
To add to the many problems small farmers are faced with, there is also the other product of Western greed – big companies buying up land for huge plantations whenever the farmers are forced to sell at a ridiculously low price. And so those former poor but proud subsistence farmers are now forced to work for a pittance for the big landlords who, instead of producing food to feed the native people, grow cotton, green beans, coffee, tea, cocoa, peanuts and other crops to sell to the rich countries. And these foods for the wealthy are often produced by small children, severely exploited by cruel farmers. Slave labor conditions are the rule.
Jean Ziegler points out in ‘Destruction massive’, p.327
“The ideologues of the World Bank are infinitely more dangerous than the sad marketing agents Bolloré, Vilgrain (French investors in Africa) and company. With hundreds of millions of dollars of credits and subsidies, the World Bank funds the theft of arable land in Africa, Asia, Latin America.”
Food has to be imported – all for the profit of the big corporations. Poor people can not afford buying imported food at artificially high prices. Children go hungry, pregnant mothers are undernourished and so their babies are born with what can be called birth defects. Very importantly, their brains are insufficiently developed and this deficiency can never be recovered. A large number of the infants die before the age of two.
Malnutrition is rampant and it causes unimaginably horrible diseases, such as noma, which is far less known than the killer diseases such as malaria, dysentery, cholera, tuberculosis, diphtheria and other infectious diseases. Noma is not an infectious disease but it has been proven that it is due to severe and chronic malnutrition.[4]
For the United States and their mercenary organizations, the IMF, the World Bank and the WTO the UN declaration of the Universal Right to Food[5] has no importance whatsoever. It is very simply ignored.
Attempts by global structures to make the right to food a human right

"The ‘United Nations’ is a term that appeared for the first time in 1941. It was tied to the combat against hunger. The World War was raging and U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill met on the battleship USS-Augusta in the Atlantic off Newfoundland. What came out of that meeting was the first major attempt to create a document declaring the basic freedoms of man, including Freedom from want and Freedom from fear.

“US President Franklin D. Roosevelt on January 6, 1941, in an address known as the Four Freedoms speech proposed four fundamental freedoms that people "everywhere in the world" ought to enjoy:
1. Freedom of speech and expression
2. Freedom of worship
3. Freedom from want
4. Freedom from fear
"His inclusion of the latter two freedoms went beyond the traditional US Constitutional values protected by its First Amendment, and endorsed a right to economic security and an internationalist view of foreign policy.”
From The Atlantic Charter which was an outcome of the meeting on the USS-Augusta, articles 4 and 6 state:
“Fourth, they will endeavor, with due respect for their existing obligations, to further the enjoyment by all States, great or small, victor or vanquished, of access, on equal terms, to the trade and to the raw materials of the world which are needed for their economic prosperity;
…
“Sixth, after the final destruction of the Nazi tyranny, they hope to see established a peace which will afford to all nations the means of dwelling in safety within their own boundaries, and which will afford assurance that all the men in all the lands may live out their lives in freedom from fear and want;” (Destruction massive, pp. 139-140)
Jean Ziegler talks about the origin of the world food programs, p. 201:

FAO [the Food and Agriculture Organization] and the World Food Programme (WFP) are the big and beautiful legacy of Josué de Castro.[6] These two institutions are threatened with ruin.
They were born, as we have seen, when the great awakening of consciousness took place in Europe that was emerging from the night of fascism: the FAO in 1945, the WFP in 1963.
The sad fate of those two organizations, however, is that they were both rendered fairly helpless when the current economic crisis took hold of the world. The mandate of the WFP is precisely to eliminate hunger and poverty in the world, but with a severely reduced budget, how were they going to reach their goal?
Jean Ziegler writes (p. 216):
“On October 22, 2008, the 17 heads of state and government from the euro zone countries gathered at the Palais de l'Elysée in Paris. At 6 o’clock, Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy appeared on the front steps of the palace, in front of the press. They declared to the reporters: "We have to free 1,700 billion to remobilize the interbank lending and to raise the floor of auto-financing of the banks by 3 to 5%." Before the end of the year 2008, subsidies from the countries in the euro zone for emergency food aid decreased by almost 50 %. The WFP budget was about $ 6 billion. It fell in 2009 to $ 3.2 billion.
…
“For 2011, WFP evaluates its minimal needs to $ 7 billion. Until early December 2010, they had received $ 2.7 billion. This loss in revenues has had dramatic consequences.”

Jean Ziegler goes on to say:
“For the United States and its mercenary organizations – the World Trade Organization (WTO), the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank – the
right to food is an aberration. To them, there are no human rights except civil and political.
“Behind the WTO, the IMF, the World Bank, the Washington government and its traditional allies, appear of course the huge private transcontinental companies. The increasing control these transcontinental corporations exert on vast sectors of food production and trade have of course significantly affected the exercise of the right to food.” (Destruction massive, p. 155)
Food for fuel
Another highly important factor in the increasingly catastrophic problem of hunger in the world is of course the use of food for fuel, which has been dealt with in some detail in the essay ‘Food for fuel, a sure way of creating a hunger crisis’ By Jean Ziegler and Siv O'Neall
It is of course perfectly clear to anybody who thinks with his brain, that growing sugar cane, wheat, corn or other food crops in huge plantations for the use of making ethanol for energy, first of all takes land away from small farmers and, secondly, ruins useful food to put gasoline in SUVs that we don’t really need.
In addition to this obvious truth, there is the crucial fact that the making of ethanol uses up more energy than it produces. It also gives off an enormous amount of carbon dioxide in the process.
Explosive increase in food prices beginning in 2007
The stage is open to the real tiger sharks, the financial speculators. Without the slightest shade of a moral conscience, they speculate on the value of a harvest, on land value, on currencies. Is it going up or down? In either case, they win, since they always hedge their bets. The noxious ‘futures trading’ has opened up the commodity market to conscience-free sharks who care only for the fast buck. These men are not dealing in any real product. They don’t sell or buy grain or anything whatever. They just speculate in the fate of these commodities, land, currencies.
The prices of corn, rice and wheat are literally exploding because of market speculation on the basic commodities. This is the Market neoliberalism that was once made out to be the self-regulating force of the Free Market.
The governments can well see the abyss that is open in front of them, but they obediently bail out the banks when the gamblers cause a total breakdown and the banks go bankrupt.
Jean Ziegler writes (p. 78):
"The speculative madness of the predators of the globalized financial capital has cost Western industrial states in 2008-2009, $ 8,900 billion in all. Western states have in particular paid trillions of dollars to bail out delinquent bankers."
Neoliberals claim that no regulations are needed, because the market is regulating itself. That way they are free to speculate, to trade indefinitely and, in many cases, without even paying capital gains taxes, without any insight or any rules. There are of course also the tax-free havens where speculators can gamble with their billions without the slightest insight or taxation.
The whole point is to the neoliberal sharks that the rich must get richer and the poor must be made powerless. The numbers of the poor have been increasing drastically ever since the beginning of neoliberalism in the eighties (exploratory beginnings in Latin America already in the seventies, with catastrophic results). Poor people are made to be so invisible, so voiceless that they can be totally disregarded. Which is precisely the goal of neoliberalism.
Conclusion
It is mind-blowing how the world can have come to a situation where it is being run by hungry sharks with no understanding of how the world economy can function in a rational way. The gamblers follow no rules whatsoever, except profit, and humanitarian considerations have no place in this casino.
What Jean Ziegler is doing in such an expert and passionate way in his latest book is denouncing the monstrosities of the world we live in, using his typical forceful style, with his trademark of genuine human empathy. He is explaining how we got to be where we are and what has to be done to remedy the gross negligence of human rights.
We can no more sit lethargically in our comfortable homes, watching the blatant propaganda that is fed to us through the Main-Stream Media, listening to the biased reports about the U.S. wars that are fought, so they tell us, in the name of freedom and democracy. The truth is that the wars are fought to make huge profits for the arms industries and all the big corporations. Take over lands and nations by war or by insidious so-called ‘aid’ that ensnares the nations in a net of debts that it is impossible to get out of.
After reading Jean Ziegler’s book, one is convinced that the time has come to act on what we know to be the truth. The West is corrupt to the gills and, if we the people are too lethargic, ignorant or frightened to do something NOW, then the pillars of the world will crumble. And that will be the end.

INDIA: Injustice, an impediment to the republic

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) congratulates India on its 63rd Republic Day. From a nation that suffered the brutal consequences of colonisation and the lasting wounds of separation, for the past 63 years, the country and its people have brilliantly shown the resilience to hold close to heart the promise they made more than six decades ago, to remain a sovereign socialist secular democratic republic. The Indian experience of democracy is of immense value in Asia, since for the most of the continent; the concept has only made cameo appearances.

Despite this, the concept of democracy and republic is incomplete, as reiterated in the Constitution, unless justice, liberty and equality are ensured to the people, without exceptions. The integrity of the nation and the dignity of its people depend on this. It is in that the country has to shed its colonial hangovers, and if required reinvent itself, as a nation where these fundamental notions implied in the term 'democratic republic' remain not just as mere words mentioned in the basic law, but realisable guarantees, for which the state should not spare any of its resources.

A recent video that was mentioned in the country's media, of the officers from the Border Security Force (BSF) brutally assaulting a suspected cross-border cattle smuggler is to the point. The nationality of the victims apart, such an incident should not have happened on the first place. That it happened shows that the country's elite border guards have no respect to the country's basic law or to their operative mandate. The video is an exception only to the extent that it was probably for the first time that such an act by the BSF stationed along the Indo-Bangladesh border has been video documented. The AHRC and its partner organisation based in West Bengal, MASUM, on more than some 800 separate occasions, reported similar incidents to the authorities, urging them to take action against the BSF officers, and suggesting that the incessant practice of manifest forms of custodial violence - ranging from torture to extra-judicial execution and rape - shows the moral wilt in the force which in itself is a threat to the security of the nation. The incident is ample proof to the fact that the agency today operates in an environment of impunity. Impunity has no place in a democratic republic.

Despicable forms of impunity are enjoyed not just by the BSF. Widespread practice of torture by the state police officers casts a dark shadow upon the very notion of the republic. The country is yet to wakeup to the reality that the practice of torture, in its entire manifest forms, is incompatible with what has been guaranteed in the Constitution. While a considerable number of people in the country, including some respectable officers within the Indian Police Service, reiterate that the present state of affairs within the law enforcement agencies cannot coexist with the demands of a modern democratic republic, there is hardly any debate within the country as to what should be done to bring about a change to this unacceptable status quo. Even the country's civil society has ignored to engage with the subject, but for a few exceptional human rights organisations, which is a minority, in relation to the large number of human rights groups that operate in India, enjoying the relatively free space that the country guarantees for human rights work. Fair trial guarantees and the basic presumption of innocence cannot coexist with the practice of torture.

When the law enforcement agencies become incompatible to undertake their responsibility according to the demands of a democratic state, it challenges not only the very concept of democracy, but also encourages inequality and therefore injustice. The recent incident reported from Balangir district, Orissa state of the torching of 40 Dalit houses by the members of a militant dominant caste is an alarming reminder to the fact that prejudices based on inequality still haunts the realisation of the true republic. The fact that an alarmingly high percentage of children from the marginalised and minority communities living in the impoverished rural backdrops of at least five states in the country do not have, nor do they expect, any hope to be saved from the certain death due to starvation and malnutrition reiterates that injustice is the practice though justice is the guarantee. A country with its law enforcement agencies enjoying impunity cannot be of any use to check this injustice.

So is the situation of the country's judiciary. That the judiciary too, and with that the country's justice framework has failed, is today no more the 'hyperbole' of human rights organisations. The country's law minister himself has reiterated this reality. In a country where its judiciary cannot expect the prosecution to be capable of assisting the court in its quest to find the truth, or a court where the trial can take anywhere between two to ten years to conclude, or worse, where the judiciary itself can guarantee that only seventy percent of its judges are honest, justice has no life. There cannot be percentages awarded to justice. There can only be either justice or injustice.

The annual remembrance of the day in which the country and its people declared for themselves a sovereign socialist secular democratic republic should not remain a day on which parades are held and speeches made. It must be also a day of introspection. Of what it implies by the sovereignty of the people, and by it, to what extent is India truly a democratic republic.

So far injustice has remained an impediment to the complete realisation of the republic. Failing to address it is as bad as undermining the republic.

INDIA: To end BSF violence what more does it require?

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) and its partner organisation, the Banglar Manabadhikar Suraksha Mancha (MASUM), have been documenting and reporting cases of extreme forms of brutality committed by the Border Security Force (BSF) stationed along the Indo-Bangladesh border in West Bengal state. The latest is a video of extreme torture by the BSF of a civilian that reportedly happened on 16 January 2012. The video shows blood-chilling torture, committed by the BSF. The incident is a shame and the brutality documented alarming, suggesting that the officers require psychiatric assistance, a condition that challenges their very legitimacy to guard the country's border.

Since the past eight years, MASUM is reporting directly and through international human rights organisations like the AHRC, cases against the BSF to the Indian authorities. So far MASUM has reported about 800 cases. These are cases of torture and other forms of custodial violence, rape, murder, extortion and corruption. The AHRC is not aware of any open and credible action taken against any of the officers mentioned in these cases, though every possible detail has been provided to the authorities.

Every case report includes a narrative of the incident, the name of the BSF officers involved, that of the outpost and battalion where the officers were stationed, the name of the police station having jurisdiction over the place where the incident happened, the name of the witnesses and their statements as recorded by MASUM, and the name and other details of the victim. This information is sent to officers, including but not limited to the Director General of the BSF, Union Home Minister, the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), the Chief Minister and Home Minister of West Bengal, Inspector General of Police and the District Magistrate having jurisdiction upon the area where the incident happened. These cases reported globally are available at AHRC's Urgent Appeals website where cases from India are reported.

Each one of these communication calls for specific actions to be taken in the incident, at the very minimum, recording the complaint of the victim and the statements of the witnesses. However, according to the information available to the AHRC, not in a single case the BSF command has initiated a credible enquiry or taken effective corrective measures against the officers. Neither has the BSF nor the government cared to acknowledge the receipt of these communications. The response from the NHRC also has been thus far disheartening.

The NHRC's action is always to direct the state police to investigate the case. The reports prepared by the West Bengal state police, always absolve the BSF from responsibility and accuses the victim as a cross-border smuggler or someone who tried attacking the BSF, when stopped for questioning. The AHRC and MASUM have been repeatedly contenting that such reports are farce and would do further damage to the morale of the BSF and of the people living along the Indo-Bangladesh border. The proof is the video.

It is a cruel joke, that the Raninagar police have claimed that they have not investigated the incident, as late as today, since they are yet to get a complaint regarding the event. Perhaps the West Bengal police have a new Criminal Procedure Code that requires them to receive a formal complaint to act upon a gruesome crime. Or is the response underlining the fact that the state police always shy away from taking any action against the BSF? The AHRC has been requesting the Government of West Bengal that it should seriously consider the fact that the rank and file of the state police stationed in areas where the BSF operates is suffering from a high degree of demoralisation.

When the video was aired yesterday through local television channels in West Bengal, the administration has taken 'action'. This is the suspension of eight BSF officers and the transferring of the District Magistrate (DM) and the Superintendent of Police (SP) of Murshidabad district. While the response is appreciated, the AHRC is of the opinion that this is not enough.

The official defensive statement by the BSF, that the video could be as old as 15 years, is nothing but irresponsibility in print. The security agency that is mandated to protect the country's border should have the minimum knowledge, that mobile telephones with a camera, now though common, was exceptionally rare 15 years ago. The BSF does not have a case that their officers exposed in the video are serving in the same outpost for the past 15 years. If the video is not of an incident that happened on 16 January, then on what reason was the officers stationed at Charmurasi border outpost suspended?

The video shows officers, identifiable in person, violating every code of their operative mandate, in some of the most brutal and inhuman manner. It shows the alarming wilt of discipline among the officers. Any agency, having such sick officers posted on duty has serious reasons to consider overhauling its operative structure to ensure basic discipline. In the BSF however, such actions are unlikely to happen. At the most the case would end, probably after a decade, with some punitive actions taken against the officers who are now placed under suspension.

The DM and the SP, of Murshidabad should have known that such incidents are common. They cannot content otherwise, since the MASUM and the AHRC together have sent these officers some 800 cases during the past eight years. These two officers have the legal responsibility to answer for what is in the video since had their office been diligent enough such incidents would not have repeated. In a case reported by the AHRC and MASUM on 19 October 2012, the victim in the case was stoned to death by the BSF. The incident happened within the jurisdiction of Raninagar Police Station. No action has been taken on this case so far. The details of the case are available at AHRC-UAC-210-2011.

The Inspector General (IG) of the BSF is also responsible for the incident since the IG's office is bound by 'command responsibility'. In the same vein, the Inspector-General commanding the South Bengal Frontier unit of the BSF and the Commandant and under whom the officers involved in the incident served are also to be punished. Command responsibility is no legal fiction. It is legal norm, which applies in this case without exception.

Most importantly the question that needs to be answered now is that what allows the BSF to perpetuate such horrendous forms of violence against unarmed civilians? Had the BSF been operating in compliance with the Border Security Force Act, 1968 and its Rules 1969, such incidents would not have happened. It shows that discipline and commitment to duty is not ensured within the rank and file in the force. Violence by the BSF against unarmed civilians and other forms of corruption and crimes committed by the BSF with impunity is a threat to the border security of the nation. Such a BSF is a threat to the entire country.

If experience were of any value, one need to see whether, at least in this occasion there would be a transparent investigation and adjudication. If national security is of any interest to the government, it should prove it by taking actions in all cases reported to the government, of crimes committed by the BSF. The AHRC is willing to once again submit to the Government of India a dossier containing details of the cases documented by the AHRC involving the BSF.

Preamble to the Constitution of India

“ WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC and to secure to all its citizens:

JUSTICE, social, economic and political;
LIBERTY of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship;
EQUALITY of status and of opportunity;
and to promote among them all
FRATERNITY assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the Nation;
IN OUR CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY this twenty-sixth day of November, 1949, do HEREBY ADOPT, ENACT AND GIVE TO OURSELVES THIS CONSTITUTION.”

Fundamental Rights of Citizens of India

Main article: Fundamental Rights in India

The Fundamental Rights, embodied in Part III of the Constitution, guarantee civil rights to all Indians, and prevent the State from encroaching on individual liberty while simultaneously placing upon it an obligation to protect the citizens' rights from encroachment by society.^[19] Seven fundamental rights were originally provided by the Constitution – right to equality, right to freedom, right against exploitation, right to freedom of religion, cultural and educational rights, right to property and right to constitutional remedies.^[20] However, the right to property was removed from Part III of the Constitution by the 44th Amendment in 1978.^[21]^{[note 2]}

The Fundamental Rights are not absolute and are subject to reasonable restrictions as necessary for the protection of public interest.^[24] In the Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala case in 1973,^{[note 4]} the Supreme Court, overruling a previous decision of 1967, held that the Fundamental Rights could be amended, subject to judicial review in case such an amendment violated the basic structure of the Constitution.^[28] The Fundamental Rights can be enhanced, removed or otherwise altered through a constitutional amendment, passed by a two-thirds majority of each House of Parliament.^[29] The imposition of a state of emergency may lead to a temporary suspension any of the Fundamental Rights, excluding Articles 20 and 21, by order of the President.^[30] The President may, by order, suspend the right to constitutional remedies as well, thereby barring citizens from approaching the Supreme Court for the enforcement of any of the Fundamental Rights, except Articles 20 and 21, during the period of the emergency.^[31] Parliament may also restrict the application of the Fundamental Rights to members of the Indian Armed Forces and the police, in order to ensure proper discharge of their duties and the maintenance of discipline, by a law made under Article 33.^[32]

Fundamental Duties of Citizens of India

The Fundamental Duties of citizens were added to the Constitution by the 42nd Amendment in 1976, upon the recommendations of the Swaran Singh Committee that was constituted by the government earlier that year. Originally ten in number, the Fundamental Duties were increased to eleven by the 86th Amendment in 2002, which added a duty on every parent or guardian to ensure that their child or ward was provided opportunities for education between the ages of six and fourteen years. The other Fundamental Duties obligate all citizens to respect the national symbols of India, including the Constitution, to cherish its heritage, preserve its composite culture and assist in its defense. They also obligate all Indians to promote the spirit of common brotherhood, protect the environment and public property, develop scientific temper, abjure violence, and strive towards excellence in all spheres of life. Citizens are morally obligated by the Constitution to perform these duties. However, like the Directive Principles, these are non-justifiable, without any legal sanction in case of their violation or non-compliance., Indian History, World Developments and Civics, p. There is reference to such duties in international instruments such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and Article 51A brings the Indian Constitution into conformity with these treaties.

INDIA: Human rights without justice a utopia
A Submission by the Asian Legal Resource Centre on the Universal Periodic Review (Second Cycle) of India
1. Background:
1.1 The first Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of India was on 10 April 2008. The Working Group of the Human Rights Council on the UPR has prepared the conclusions and recommendations made by the delegations that participated in the interactive dialogue on the UPR of India.ⁱ The Government of India after examining the recommendations responded to the recommendations on 25 August 2008.ⁱⁱ
1.2 Protection, promotion and fulfilment or human rights requires an effective architecture of justice delivery. The interactive dialogue in 2008 demonstrated the lack of understanding and focus of this fundamental, thereby missing out vital issues in India like (i) decades long court delays in adjudication; (ii) lack of competence and independence of the country's prosecution and law-enforcement agencies; and (iii) widespread and omnipresent corruption that prevents the reach of government welfare programs to the poor.
1.3 Though some of the stakeholders' reports, including the one submitted by the ALRC highlighted these aspects; it was not a point of discussion during the interactive dialogue. This lack of focused engagement on some of the vital issues that adversely affects human rights in India is reflected in the concluding recommendations, thereby rendering nine out of 18 recommendations, broad and general, which even if complied would not have a direct, immediate and positive impact upon the lives of the people in the country.
1.4 The concluding recommendationsⁱⁱⁱ on India could be summarised into four main limbs:
i. Curb entrenched practice of torture by an effective domestic mechanism;
ii. Take effective actions to prevent all forms of discrimination, including those based on caste, gender or against the minorities;
iii. Ensure that development priorities respect the needs of the extremely poor and marginalised, in particular children and take affirmative actions to prevent distress migration of the rural poor;
iv. An overall improvement in the architecture of justice delivery.
1.5 The government's response to the Council to the recommendations was mixed as expected of concurrence and denial. The domestic implementation of the recommendations has been almost absent, or at the most, half-hearted. This submission attempts to assess the compliance of India of the four main limbs of the recommendations from the first review and to once again suggest issues that should be seriously considered during the second cycle of the UPR of India.
2. On torture:
2.1 India has not ratified CAT. There has been no serious debate within the Indian parliament concerning ratification, an essential requirement in a dualist system that practices parliamentary democracy. This is despite promises, by none other than the Prime Minister, that the country would ratify the convention, as early as 2009.^iv
2.2 India has not moved forward since then on the issue other than the introduction of a Bill in the parliament, the Prevention of Torture Bill 2010.^v The Lok Sabha passed the Bill on 6 May 2010. The Rajya Sabha, constituted a Parliamentary Select Committee to review the Bill. The Committee suggested wide-ranging changes to the Bill.^vi The Bill is now with the government and nothing is heard about it since then.
2.3 It is expected that the government would highlight the Bill as an important and vital step forward towards the ratification of CAT and the criminalisation of torture in India. However, the ALRC, like the Parliamentary Select Committee, is of the opinion that the proposed law is eyewash. The law requires substantial revision, including its definition of 'torture', which currently fails to meet the definitional standard prescribed in the CAT. The proposed law limits the operation of the definition to "causing grievous hurt" or "danger to life, limb or health (mental or physical)".
2.4 An action against torture will require prior sanction from the government as per Section 6 of the Bill. The rider in Section 6 is a limiting clause that could delay or even deny prosecutions. The bill also enforces a period of limitation of six months for filing a complaint vide Section 5.^vii
2.5 In the meanwhile the practice of torture continues unabated, and is widespread in India. The ALRC has documented more than three hundred cases of torture from India during the period 2008-11. Torture happens in all forms of custody - judicial, police, military and inside prisons. The number of successful prosecution is extremely low, estimated to be one case for every 125 cases.
2.6 Rampant use of torture and the lack of prosecution demoralises the law enforcement officers. It creates a culture of fear and discourages victims from filing complaints. There is no government agency in India that specialises in providing psychological assistance to victims of torture. There is no independent agency to investigate complaints of torture either.
2.7 The use of torture as a common tool for criminal investigation has a direct bearing upon maintaining law and order and upon criminal trials. The use of enforced confessions as the primary tool for criminal investigation is one of the reasons for the mere 4% rate of conviction since the past two decades.
2.8 Law-enforcement agencies are neither capable nor equipped to deal with the increasing and diverse security threats the country face. This is reflected in their operative legal framework. The Indian Police Act, 1861 is the product of the colonial rule that fits the requirements of a police force essential to run a colony.
2.9 India's police today is unfit to serve a democracy. The police are under resourced; lacks training and is unfit to operate in a democratic state. The government conceive the law enforcement agencies as rule enforcers and not as a public service. In international fora the government maintains the position that since the country's judiciary is largely independent, corrective measures could be taken through the courts to address the problems in policing and that it serves as a strong deterrent against torture.
2.10 The D.K. Basu judgment quoted by the government during the first session is an example.^viii But the ALRC wishes to reiterate that all the cases documented by the ALRC since the D.K. Basu judgment, some 790 cases of torture, violates the dictum in the case. Yet, NOT a single police officer or a state government has been held on contempt by the court. On a similar vein, the Police Complaints Authority to be constituted by virtue of yet another judgment, the Prakash Singh case, is not constituted in most states so far.^ix
2.11 It is therefore expected that during the UPR, the interactive dialogue would focus among other issues, requesting the government of India to reform the operative framework of its law enforcement agencies. Towards this end, it is not enough that the agencies provided with adequate physical and financial operative resources, but further, torture has to be criminalised and an independent agency that is not associated with the police, should be constituted in every state of India to accept and investigate complaints of torture.
3. On caste-based discrimination
3.1 Caste-based discrimination is the Indian variant of apartheid and continues unabated in India.^x The stoning to death of 22-year-old Swapna, and her husband, 28-year-old Sunkari Sriniwas on 23 May 2010 by Swapna's family near Krishnajiwadi village, Nizamabad, Andhra Pradesh state is one more proof to the stark reality of the continuing practice of caste-based discrimination and caste prejudices in India. Swapna belongs to a Hindu dominant caste family. Her parents and relatives were opposed to Swapna's marriage with Sriniwas, a Dalit.
3.2 While India has been defiant and opposed to national and international criticism on everything related to caste-based discrimination, it has refused to show similar sensitivity in dealing with the issue at the domestic level. Though the country had enacted laws to counter caste-based discrimination, of which some are currently under review, like the Scheduled Castes and Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989; it is a reality, the implementation of these legislations are half hearted and often left at the mercy of caste-prejudiced law enforcement officers.
3.3 Though India boasts about some of its senior bureaucrats, a former President, Chief Ministers and judges, including the former Chief Justice, as members of the Dalit community, in reality, the effect has been only symbolic. The ordinary Dalit continues to face discrimination and social stigmatisation throughout the country. The fact that the parents of a woman went to the extent of stoning their own daughter to death for marrying an untouchable Dalit, underlines the fact that mere legislations will not end caste-based discrimination. The incident also is the grim reminder to the fact that caste prejudice is deep-rooted in India. To deal with such a deep-rooted violence mere law making is not enough.
3.4 A legal text is only the mere codification of certain principles, norms and rules. In punitive jurisprudence, a law could also be a deterrent against a crime. But the deterrence factor of the crime, in this case, caste-based discrimination as referred to in the Act, depends upon the effectiveness in the execution of the law. This is where India and its entire justice institutions and policies have failed.
3.5 The ALRC has documented cases over the past three years, where atrocities committed against the Dalits were refused to be registered as crimes at police stations. This is also reflected in the low number of cases registered across India for offenses punishable under the SC & ST Act.^xi The general failure of the law-enforcement mechanism in the country coupled with the caste prejudice of the officer who runs the system poses a double walled challenge to a complainant who would want to register and investigate his complaint and prosecute a person who has committed a crime that is covered under the Act.
3.6 In addition to the lack of willingness of the government to root out caste prejudice is the omnipresence of the caste-prejudiced mind in government policies. One example is the continuing practice of manual scavenging. In spite of a dozen laws preventing manual scavenging the practice continues in India due to more than one reason, of which an important one is the lack of adequate sanitary facilities in most parts of the country. Investment in proper sanitation facilities is a factor overlooked even in the national capital, New Delhi.
3.7 The ALRC expects that the government of India will be encouraged in the UPR to take affirmative actions, beyond legislations, like implementing mandatory requirements of acceptance of complaints, prompt investigations and fast prosecutions of crimes committed against the oppressed castes (Dalits).
4. Need for an all-inclusive policy of development
4.1 The Republic of Korea engaged India during the 2008 UPR upon India's policies on development. Today unfortunately a South Korean registered entity, the POSCO (formerly Pohang Iron and Steel Company), accounts to the single largest destruction of natural environment and displacement by a foreign direct investment led industrial project in India. The project negates all premises of sustainable development, respect to the rights of indigenous communities and enforces distress migration and violates the guarantees of the acclaimed The Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006.
4.2 The ALRC has reported cases where the POSCO itself has been allegedly employing criminals to silence anti-POSCO movements. Human rights activists who oppose break-neck-speed development are accused by the state government as anti-state forces or Naxalites or Maoists and are arrested and detained indefinitely. This is a pattern observed throughout the country.
4.3 It is from states, like Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal that large numbers of people migrate to other parts of the country, in search for job and livelihood. A substantial number of them end up being exploited and work as bonded labourers. Of the worst affected are women and children.
4.4 When the representatives of the ALRC met Justice Ms. Sheela Khanna, the Chairperson of Madhya Pradesh State Commission for Protection of Child Rights to seek intervention on this scenario as well as to address child malnutrition that is rampant among the children of the tribal community in the state, the Chairperson opined that those children brought to the Nutrition Rehabilitation Centres should be asked to produce their horoscope and if they are found to become worthy citizens of the state by a Brahmin priest reading their horoscope, then only state resources should be spent to recover their life.^xii
4.5 Development is essential for any country to progress. What is required however is to bring transparency, accountability and public audit into development schemes that the private and public sector are competing to implement in India. Even before conceiving a project, it must be mandatory to conduct a public audit of the project proposal. It is built into a reasonable extent in the local self-governance framework in India. However, corruption has so far prevented this proviso from being properly implemented.
4.6 The ALRC expects that the second cycle of the UPR would be an opportunity where India is urged to bring functioning, transparent mechanisms to prevent widespread corruption in India, which is the singular factor that denies benefits of development and government welfare schemes to the rural poor. Instead of stifling whistleblowers like those who use the Right to Information Act, 2005 - which is a widespread pattern in India - the country should provide a safety mechanism to protect them.
5. On justice architecture and draconian legislations like the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958
5.1 The Prime Minister of India, addressing the sixth annual convention of Information Commissioners in New Delhi said that the government would be critically reviewing the Right to Information Act, 2005 (RTI) so that the legislation does not "affect the deliberative process in the government". In his speech delivered on 14 October 2011, addressing the conference the Prime Minister indicated some areas where the law should be recalibrated according to the government, so that genuine public interests could be upheld. The Prime Minister also emphasised the need to protect RTI activists as they are often subjected to extreme forms of threats.^xiii The risk is higher in states where the AFSPA is enforced.
5.2 The AHRC congratulates the government for its openness to acknowledge that improvement in administration - translate into governance - and prevention of corruption can only be realised through legal and administrative reforms aided by technology. However, such reforms to materialise, drastic reforms of the justice-rendering framework is required.
5.3 The most important of all is the drastic change that need to be brought into the functioning of the courts. The country's judiciary will take at least 365 years to complete the present backlog of cases. The present Chief Justice of India, Justice Mr H S Kapadia has reaffirmed this, stated by twenty-two of his predecessors, in May 2010. Yet, neither the judiciary, nor the government has made it a realistic priority to address the backlog of cases. In essence, the judiciary is incapable of delivering justice.
5.4 When the investigative limb of the state suffers from low morale, inefficiency and the lack of public appreciation and the adjudicative limb suffers from enormous amounts of delay and incapacitated to deal with the sheer volume of work; chaos, confusion and inefficiency is a natural consequence. Translating this into the context of maintaining the rule of law implies that injustice is the norm and justice an exception in the society. Drastic measures are required to bring an end to this 'organised lawlessness'. The resultant environment is exploited not only by armed secessionist forces that operate in India, but also by the law-enforcement agencies that enjoy impunity.
5.5 Where the government feels that its writ is threatened and the integrity of the state challenged, a draconian legislation like the AFSPA is not an answer. The AFSPA is synonymous with injustice, discrimination and impunity. The law has attracted, repeatedly, wide-ranging criticisms from jurists, human rights activists, and even politicians within India and abroad.^xiv
5.6 The ALRC has documented more than two hundred cases, over the past eight years, where the state agencies operating under the statutory impunity provided by the Act has committed serious human rights violations in states like Manipur.^xv So far not a single military or police officer has been prosecuted for the human rights abuses they have committed under the cover of impunity provided by this law.
5.7 A discussion on the fundamental that for a country to protect the principles of the rule of law requires functioning justice institutions, that could accept and investigate complaints and deliver justice is absent in India. However, India today is at a crossroad. Should India fail in nurturing human rights and democratic values, it can adversely impact the region and can have global consequences.
5.8 The ALRC expects that the second UPR on India will be an opportunity to encourage the government to redefine its restructuring priorities so that reforming justice institutions would be the priority for the government, thereby doing justice to its voluntary pledge the country has made to its people and to the international community.

28 November 2011
ALRC
Hong Kong

INDIA – UPR Submission

In its submission for its first Universal Periodic Review in April 2008, India said that its “approach towards protection and promotion of human rights has been characterized by a holistic, multi-pronged effort.” It cited the Indian constitution and numerous government policies to demonstrate its commitment to the protection of rights.
However, India is yet to introduce adequate laws and properly implement existing policies to protect marginalized communities, particularly Dalits, tribal groups, religious minorities, women, and children.There is an urgent need for the state to addresshuman rights violations, including all forms of sexual assault against women,communal violence, enforced disappearances in conflict areas, extrajudicial killings, the persistent use of torture, and increasing attacks against human rights defenders. Tying many of these issues together is the widespread lack of accountability for human rights abuses, and the corresponding problems of access to justice and adequate compensation.

Impunity for serious human rights violations
The government of India has not implemented its UPR Recommendation 1 to expedite theratification of the Convention against Torture and its Optional Protocol.The Prevention of Torture Bill is still at a draft stage. India also failed to implement UPR recommendation 12 to ratify the Convention against Enforced Disappearance. Human Rights Watch has long documented a pattern of impunity, often permitted under Indian law. Since the first UPR, Human Rights Watch has documented an ongoing failure to prosecute those responsible for past human rights violations, such as during counter-insurgency operations in Punjab from 1985-1996, as well as continuing violations in conflict areas such as Jammu and Kashmir, Manipur, and Assam. There have been allegations of violations during security operations that began in 2009 against Maoist insurgents operating in central and eastern India. Abuses include arbitrary arrests and detention, torture, extrajudicial killings, and the harassment of civilians caught in the conflict.
A series of Indian laws also make it difficult or impossible to prosecute state officials and agents implicated in abuses. In particular, police and paramilitary forces are protected under section 197 of the Criminal Procedure Code, which provides that no court will recognize any offense alleged to have been committed by a public servant in the discharge of an official duty without the express approval of the central or state government. Military personnel are provided with additional immunity when they are deployed in areas of internal conflict under the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA). Permission to prosecute is rarely granted, even when an investigation shows strong evidence of human rights violations.
With legal cover provided to police and armed forces, abuses such as extrajudicial killings occur often during counter-insurgency operations, for which the Supreme Court expressed its concern in January 2011.However, in most cases the police or army's explanation of an "armed encounter" goes uninvestigated, although many officials privately admit to Human Rights Watch that extrajudicial executions are widespread. The failure to implement police reform has created an overworked and undertrained force that often resorts to torture to gather evidence, and uses extrajudicial killings when it cannot secure convictions. Without proper accountability mechanisms, these violations have become the norm.
Although the Indian government claims that it has internal systems of inquiry and punishment to tackle violations by security forces, details of any prosecutions or convictions through such measures are seldom available. Using the Right to Information Act, Kashmiri activists discovered in September 2011 that in 50 cases where the government sought permission to prosecute, 26 were refused, while a response is awaited in 16 others.
Due to interventions by the Supreme Court, some arrests have been made in relation to the attacks on Muslims in Gujarat in 2002. In November 2011, thirty-one people were convicted for the killing of 33 people, most of them women and children, in the village of Sardarpura in Gujarat’s Mehsana district in March 2002. This was one of the nine cases investigated and prosecuted under Supreme Court supervision after it became evident that the Gujarat police had shown no real inclination to investigate and file charges against the perpetrators.

Government of India’s Actions to Address Impunity
Various inquiries have been set up to address issues of impunity and accountability, particularly in areas of armed conflict. However, the findings of such committees are often not publicly disclosed and are routinely ignored. For instance, a 2004 committee appointed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh following protests in Manipur has recommended the repeal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act. Although the report was leaked, it is yet to be officially accepted or acted upon.
Kashmiri political leaders have also repeatedly called for repeal of AFSPA. In August 2011, an official inquiry by the State Human Rights Commission in Jammu and Kashmir confirmed allegations by human rights groups that victims of enforced disappearances may have been buried in unmarked graves. The government had claimed that the graves contained only the remains of unidentified Pakistani militants. The commission recommended forensic tests for proper identification, but a proper investigation will require the cooperation of the army and paramilitary units that were involved in these operations.
The Indian government is yet to enact the Prevention of Torture bill, which was introduced to ratify the Convention against Torture. The draft bill falls short of international standards by permitting certain officials immunity from prosecution, not giving victims adequate time to file complaints, and not ensuring that all forms of inhuman and degrading treatment are under the purview of the law. A parliamentary committee has reviewed the bill and submitted its recommendations to the cabinet.
In recent years, the political leadership of India, including the prime minister, has repeatedly said that there will be “zero tolerance” of human rights abuses. In a positive step to end the profiling of Muslims as terrorism suspects, the political leadership has repeatedly emphasized that targeting on religious grounds is wrong. There have been fresh investigations into terror attacks that were previously attributed to Muslim groups, where members of the majority Hindu community have been arrested and prosecuted.

The government has committed to enacting the Communal Violence (Prevention, Control and Rehabilitation of Victims) bill, which is intended to prevent and control communal violence, ensure speedy investigation and trials, and provide prompt rehabilitation of victims.
While civil society welcomed the openness and collaboration demonstrated by the governmentduring the visit of the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights defenders in January 2011, it also notedthat some crucial mandate holders such as the rapporteurs on torture, extrajudicial, summary or arbitraryexecutions, children, racial discrimination, or the Working Group on arbitrary detention have madenumerous requests for country visits and have not yet received a response.

State Institutions to Promote and Protect Human Rights
India boasts of its independent judiciary, which has a strong voice in protecting human rights. However, lower courts tend to support the authorities in accepting questionable charges in terror-related cases. Judicial delays due to overload mean that the appeals process can linger while a person remains in custody. Human Rights Watch considers that the implementation of UPR Recommendations 3 and 4 requires further efforts.
The government of India refers to the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) as its symbol of commitment to the protection of human rights. In its 2008 submission to the UPR, the government described the independence of the NHRC as at a par with the Supreme Court of India. However, the NHRC has very limited capacity to independently investigate allegations of abuse, and relies on relevant government departments to provide information. It uses police investigators to investigate allegations against the police. The NHRC is prohibited by law from investigating violations by the armed forces under section 19 of the Human Rights Protection Act. It can only seek a report from the central government and make recommendations. Since such reports are sought from the very agency accused of the violation, they rarely uncover abuses. The NHRC remains largely inaccessible to the poor, its inquiry procedures cumbersome, and often those who testify against state officials are not adequately protected against retribution.
In 2008 the government also claimed that there were a number of state human rights commissions that protected rights. However, in reality almost all state commissions are inadequately staffed, with almost no capacity or political will to conduct independent investigations.
The government also referred to other national commissions created to protect the rights of women, religious minorities, Dalits and tribal communities, and children. However, members and chairpersons of these commissions are political appointees and this is often reflected in their functioning, with some more effective than others.

Protection of Women
Gender training for the lower and higher judiciary is ongoing but remains inadequate. For example, in rape trials, many lower criminal courts and appellate courts have for decades reinforceddamagingsocial stereotypes against victims by describing them as “habituated to sex” based on archaic and degrading medical examinations such as the “two-finger test.” In some cases the fact that they are identified as “habituated to sex” has resulted in the courts discrediting victims’ testimony, affecting the outcome of the trial.
The NHRC has the power to take action on its own (suomoto) of reports to investigatehuman rights violations. But the commission has failed to use this power effectively. For example, the Indian government’s maternal healthcare program is administered in a blatantly discriminatory manner in many parts of the country, with no action from the NHRC. In many states, the Indian government’s flagship JananiSurakshaYojana (Safe Motherhood Program) provides cash assistance for poor pregnant women to give birth in health facilities, only up to two live births, and limits such assistance to mothers above age 18, completely excluding young mothers and mothers with more than two children, even though they face considerably higher health risks during pregnancy.

Access to Palliative Care
In 2009, a Human Rights Watch study found that hundreds of thousands of patients with cancer and other serious health conditions in India unnecessarily suffer from severe pain every year because they cannot get access to effective, safe, and inexpensive medications that could relieve their suffering.
Although about 70 percent of cancer patients in India are diagnosed when their cancer is advanced and they are unlikely to still respond to curative treatment, more than half of India’s regional cancer centers (which receive government support) do not offer palliative care or effective treatment for moderate to severe pain.
The central government recommended in 1998 that all states and union territories simplify regulations around access to morphine, an essential medication for treatment of moderate to severe pain, but only 14 states and territories have done so to date. All others maintain highly restrictive regulations that interfere with proper medical practice.

Attacks on Education
In investigations carried out between 2008- 2010, Human Rights Watch documented that the education of tens of thousands of India’s most disadvantaged and marginalized children is being disrupted by the ongoing conflict between Maoist (“Naxalite”) insurgents and police and other security forces. The Maoists have targeted and bombed government schools. In 2009, at least 36 schools in Jharkhand state and 23 schools in Bihar state were attacked. The government’s failure to repair the bombed schools promptly prolongs the negative impact of these attacks on children’s education.
Meanwhile, security forces continue to occupy government school buildings as bases for their anti-insurgency operations, sometimes only for a few days but often for periods lasting months or years. In 2010, at least the following number of schools had long-term occupations from security forces: 30 in Bihar, 31 in Chhattisgarh, 20 in Jharkhand, 16 in Tripura, and an unknown number in Assam.
Both the Maoist attacks and the government occupation and use of schools place students at unnecessary risk and interfere with the right to education.

Recommendations to be made to the Indian government:
On addressing impunity, India should:

Repeal all legal provisions providing effective immunity to government officials such as section 197 of the Criminal Procedure Code.
Repeal the Armed Forces Special Powers Act.
Vigorously investigate and prosecute officials who order, commit, or tolerate human rights violations, including torture, custodial killings, faked armed encounter killings, and enforced disappearances.
Ensure in drafting the Prevention of Torture Bill that no immunity from prosecution is provided, that adequate time is given for victims to be able file complaints, and to ensure that all forms of inhuman and degrading treatment are also brought under the purview of the law.
Engage in immediate efforts at police reform and establish transparent accountability mechanisms.
Ensure prompt prosecutions in case of communal violence and enact a strong law to protect against such acts.

On institutions to promote and protect human rights, India should:

Ensure all individuals have equal access to justice and right to remedies, and examine and remedy the shortcomings in the effectiveness of existing justice mechanisms.
Amend the Human Rights Protection Act to allow the National Human Rights Commission to independently investigate allegations of abuse by members of the armed forces.
Empower the NHRC, the state human rights commissions and other national commissions to function independently, infull autonomy, and to have the capacity for independent investigations.
Provide victims and their beneficiaries with reparations through a prompt and effective procedure that redresses the entire scope of the violations.
Ensure that the NHRC and other national and state commissions are more responsive to civil society complaints and interventions.
Provide comprehensive human rights education and training at all levels of governmentand across sectors, and the armed forces.

On women’s rights, India should:

Enact a comprehensive law against all forms of sexual assault against women and children and provide reproductive and mental health services to survivors of sexual assault.
Ensure that maternal health care programs do not discriminate against women with more than two children or mothers under the age of 18.

On discrimination and protecting vulnerable populations, India should:

Provide disaggregated data and status information on all vulnerablegroups including minorities, indigenous people, Dalits, people with disabilities, LGBT people, migrants, and internally displaced persons.
Enact rehabilitation laws to ensure the protection of communities displaced by development, infrastructure, or mining projects.

On access to palliative care, India should:

Take immediate steps to ensure that all regional cancer centers offer palliative care services.
Take immediate steps to ensure all states and territories implement simplified morphine regulations.

On human rights treaties and UN special procedures, India should:

Promptly ratify the Convention against Enforced Disappearance.
Issue a standing invitation to UN special procedures to conduct country visits to India and respond positively to the nine special procedures that have made requests for country visits.
Facilitate, as a matter of priority, the visits to India of the Special Rapporteur on torture, the Working Group on arbitrary detention, and the Working Group on enforced or involuntary disappearances.

On attacks on education facilities, India should:

Comply with court orders that all security forces vacate all educational institutions and school buildings, and ensure that the security forces do not unlawfully occupy such institutions in the future.
Cooperate with states affected by Maoist attacks to prepare rapid advance systems, so that when Maoist attacks on schools occur, schools are quickly repaired or rebuilt, and destroyed educational material replaced, so that children can return to school as soon as safely possible. During reconstruction, students should receive their education in an alternative locale.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights

PREAMBLE

Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,
Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people,
Whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law,
Whereas it is essential to promote the development of friendly relations between nations,
Whereas the peoples of the United Nations have in the Charter reaffirmed their faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person and in the equal rights of men and women and have determined to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom,
Whereas Member States have pledged themselves to achieve, in co-operation with the United Nations, the promotion of universal respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms,
Whereas a common understanding of these rights and freedoms is of the greatest importance for the full realization of this pledge,
Now, Therefore THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY proclaims THIS UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction.

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Article 1.

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

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Article 2.

Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.

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Article 3.

Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.

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Article 4.

No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.

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Article 5.

No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

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Article 6.

Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.

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Article 7.

All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.

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Article 8.

Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals for acts violating the fundamental rights granted him by the constitution or by law.

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Article 9.

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.

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Article 10.

Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.

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Article 11.

(1) Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence.
(2) No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed.

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Article 12.

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.

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Article 13.

(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.
(2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.

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Article 14.

(1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.
(2) This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

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Article 15.

(1) Everyone has the right to a nationality.
(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.

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Article 16.

(1) Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution.
(2) Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses.
(3) The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.

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Article 17.

(1) Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others.
(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.

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Article 18.

Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.

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Article 19.

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

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Article 20.

(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.
(2) No one may be compelled to belong to an association.

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Article 21.

(1) Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives.
(2) Everyone has the right of equal access to public service in his country.
(3) The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.

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Article 22.

Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realization, through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organization and resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity and the free development of his personality.

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Article 23.

(1) Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.
(2) Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work.
(3) Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection.
(4) Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.

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Article 24.

Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay.

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Article 25.

(1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.
(2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.

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Article 26.

(1) Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.
(2) Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.
(3) Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.

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Article 27.

(1) Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.
(2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.

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Article 28.

Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.

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Article 29.

(1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.
(2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.
(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

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Article 30.

Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.

……………………..DECLARATION………………………

Name : ...........................NAGARAJA.M.R.

Address : ...................LIG-2 / 761 , HUDCO FIRST STAGE , OPP
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Professional / Trade Title : S.O.S - e – Clarion Of  Dalit

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Monetary gains : nil , never made any monetary gain by way of advertisements on my websites or web news paper or otherwise.

Owner/editor/printer/publisher : NAGARAJA.M.R.

Nationality : INDIAN

Body Donation : Physical Body of Nagaraja M R , Editor , S.O.S- e – clarion of Dalit &  S.O.S-e-Voice for Justice is donated  to JSS Medical College , Mysore ( Donation No. 167 dated 22 / 10 / 2003 ) , In case of either Unnatural death or Natural Death at the hands of criminal nexus , my body must be  handed over to JSS Medical College , Mysore for the study purposes of  medical students.

Eye Donation : Both EYES  of Nagaraja M R , Editor , S.O.S- e – clarion of Dalit &  S.O.S-e-Voice for Justice are donated  to Mysore Eye Bank , Mysore , In case of either Unnatural death or Natural Death at the hands of criminal nexus , my  eyes  must be  handed over to  Mysore Eye Bank  , Mysore  WITHIN 6 Hours  for immediate eye transplantation to the needy.

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BHOPAL Gas Case Verdict FIXED

2012-01-18T22:15:00.003-08:00

S.O.S - e - Clarion Of Dalit - Weekly Newspaper On Web

Working For The Rights & Survival Of The Oppressed

Editor: NAGARAJ.M.R… VOL.6 issue. 4…… 25/01/2012

“There is a higher court than the court of justice and that is the court of conscience It supercedes all other courts. ”
- Mahatma Gandhi

Editorial : BHOPAL GAS VERDICT FIXED - Shame Shame to Supreme Court of India & Supreme Court of USA

Now it is a known fact that Bhopal Gas Leak Case Verdict was FIXED years before , MATCH FIXED by then MP Government Chief Minister , Indian Prime Minister and most shame fully Chief Justice of India.

Now The Final Verdict is out in Bhopal Gas Tragedy . This kind of Injustice can only happen in banana republics , where rich crooks are protected by authorities & courts. SHAME SHAME to supreme court of India , supreme court of USA & Government of USA , for practicing double standards in enforcement of law & justice.

Double standards of supreme court of India

http://sites.google.com/site/sosevoiceforjustice/is-the-supreme-court-of-india-deaf-dumb-blind

PIL Appeal & Show Cause Notice to Supreme Court of India

http://sites.google.com/site/eclarionofdalit/pil-appeal-show-cause-notice-to-supreme-court-of-india

In India, Favorable treatment is given by police & courts of law for rich crooks where as poor innocents are harassed , tortured by the very same police & judges . In india Some MP , MLAs even take money for asking questions in parliament / legislature , Favourable laws are enacted to legalize crimes of rich crooks for example : Illegal land encroachments by rich crooks. The same MPs , MLAs are not aware about problems of poor public , they don’t even open their mouth for asking questions on welfare of poor , let alone enact laws for welfare of poor. No government law , no decisions of judges , no orders of public servants are sacrosanct . Hereby , e-voice urges the supreme court of india ,

1. To legally prosecute the jurisdictional police who changed the charge sheet , who let out Main criminal Anderson illegally without orders from the court.

2. To legally prosecute the SSP , DC of the district , Then Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh & Then Prime Minister of GOI , who fully aided the main accussed , criminal Anderson to escape , to jump law.

3. To legally prosecute Indian Public Servants , who were responsible for withdrawing the case from US Courts of Justice.

4. To legally prosecute Then Chief Justice of India Justice Ahmadi & His bench colleagues , who diluted the case by changing the clause under which Anderson & others were charged.

The Public servants – Mps , MLAs , Judges , IAS / IPS officers , Police take thousands of rupees monthly salary , cars , bungalows , 5-star hotel stay together with 5-star meal complete with alchoholic drinks , 5-star health care at premium hospitals , business class air travel , foreign tours , etc all at tax payer’s expense. After enjoying to the hilt at taxpayer’s expense , these same public servants don’t serve the public , they serve the rich crooks , anti nationals in their greed for more money.

All the while the same poor tax payer suffers without justice . In India more than 50 Crore people are barely surviving on a single piece meal .Let the corrupt public servants eat their 5-star meals by the side of the graves of Bhopal Gas Victims. Atleast this will open the eyes of honest few in public service – police , judiciary & parliament , it is a fond hope. Jai Hind. Vande Mataram.

Your’s sincerely,

Nagaraj.M.R.

HANG CORRUPT JUDGES , CORRUPT POLICE , CORRUPT TAX OFFICIALS… TO LAMP POSTS

- Another independence struggle in India needed ?

After 62 years of india's independence the lives of commoners is far worse than under britishers. The benefits of independence has reached only few , thus creating islands of few ultra rich people surrounded by vast sea of utterly poor. The rich people in nexus with those in power , are getting favourable laws enacted to suit their ends. Those in power are shamelessly enjoying 5-star luxuries all at tax payer's expense , while more then 50 million are starving to death.

The criminalization of politics , executive & judiciary is almost complete. The corruption has spread it's tentacles far & wide , there is corruption from womb to tomb ,from maternity hospital to grave yard. The injustices meated out , the atrocities perpetrated by by public servants are worse than britishers.

Ideally in a democracy, the legal recourse of grievance redressal / justice , when a commoner suffers injustice he can appeal to respective government official or police for justice , still if doesn't get justice he can appeal to court of law , further the aggrieved can get the appropriate law enacted through his M.P / M.L.A. The sad part in India is no public servant is neither aware of the value of our hard won independence or the working of democracy.

When all the legal recourses to justice fail to respond , to provide justice to the aggrieved , when corrupt judges-police-politician-public servants act as a criminal nexus & block justice delivery, the commoner has only 2 options , either to suffer in silence or to take law into his own hands & get justice on his own.

Take for instance Bombay riots case several VVIPs – cabinet ministers , police were found to be guilty of torture , murders of innocents by justice sri Krishna enquiry commission. The government is sitting over enquiry commission report. The court is not taking suo-motto action in public interests a result , the guilty ministers & police who are fit cases for death sentences are roaming free & commiting more crimes , anti-national activities.

In some cases , involving the rich &mighty ,higher police officials , the cover-up begins right from start ie FIR Registration. Police conduct name sake enquiry , investigation, suppress evidences , witnesses , destroy some of them , the prosecution takes a favourable stand putting up weak arguments. Naturally, the guilty official , minister is acquitted by court for lack of evidences. So, the guilty who should have been rightfully put behind bars , hanged goes scot-free , to commit more crimes , more anti-national activities.

In such cases , if the suffering public give the legal punishment to the guilty , which should have been given by the court but failed. Are not such acts of public, to uphold law & dignity , national security right & patriotic ? if any body terms it as crime , that means guilty VVIPs , police , public servants should be left unpunished allowing them to commit more crimes , anti-national activities. Is that right from national security angle ? is it equality before law & equitable justice ?

Do remember that our freedom fighters ,martyrs ,sri.kudiram bose ,subhash Chandra bose , bhagath singh , veer savarkar others who took violent path of independence struggle & killed inhuman british officers, police & judges have contributed valuably ,immensely to our freedom struggle. One of the main causes of origin of naxalism ,separatist movements is the rampant corruption & unaccountability of public servants in India.

In this back drop , in India anarchy is not far away. The days of suffering public ,killing their tormentors corrupt police , corrupt judges , corrupt tax officials ,etc is not far away. No police security , no SPG cover can protect those corrupt , as police & SPG personnel work for pay , perks and will be on the wrong side of law – protecting criminals. The suffering public fighting for their survival , on the right side of natural justice , protecting the nation.

If the authorities term this act as illegal , crime then are the acts of corrupt public servants legal ? is the cover-up of such corrupt acts by police , vigilance officials & some judges by mis quoting /misinterpreting , misusing law is right , legal ? the GOI has created , funded , supported , given training , arms & ammunition to various terrorist outfits like LTTE , MUKTHI BAHINI ,MQM in foreign countries , resulting in destruction , mass murders of innocents there . In india itself in assam , Kashmir , the GOI has created counter terrorist outfits to reduce the reach of terrorist groups. The bihar , jharkhand , chattisgarh state governments have created armed gangs SALWA JUDUM to counter naxal outfits , are all these acts of government right , legal ? the days of dogs death for corrupt is quite nearby. it is high time , to the corrupt to reform , repent themselves.

In our own experience, e-voice didn't get justice from authorities in many cases of injustices brought before it , most shameful fact even supreme court of India failed to register PILs , even shameful supreme court of India even failed to give information as per RTI Act , utterly shameful supreme court of India failed to protect the fundamental rights of editor of e-voice & obstructed him from performing his fundamental duties. Still, e-voice believes in peace , democratic practices. E-voice firmly believes that violence should not be practiced by anybody – neither state nor public.

Hereby, e-voice urges the corrupt public servants to mend their ways , to uphold law & dignity of democratic institutions. Atrocities , violence , corruption breeds more violence , invites dog's death. Peace ,truth , honesty is the harbinger of prosperous democratic nation. let us build a true democratic India , free of corrupt public servants.

Shame! India sold its dead cheap

Shobhan Saxena,

Around 22,000 dead. More than 1,20,000 injured. Rs 1 lakh for each body. Rs 25,000 for every poisoned lung and damaged heart and blinded eyes. 26 years of long wait. And just 2 years in jail for the men who committed the worst crime against the people of this country. And this mockery of justice after such a long wait. Twenty six years after 40 tonnes of lethal gas seeped into the lungs of Bhopal, families of some 17,000 men, women and children are still waiting for the so-called compensation. Thousands more are still waiting to be accepted as victims. People of Bhopal are still drinking toxic water poisoned by Union Carbide in December 1984. And the main culprit is living life kingsize in a mansion in New York.

No country sells its people so cheap.
No country sells its poor so cheap.
No country sells its dead so cheap.

Today – on the day of Bhopal disaster judgment -- if there is a failed state in the world, it’s India. It’s not Iraq. It’s not Somalia. It’s not Sudan. It’s India.

India – its government, judiciary and corporates – accepted the ridiculous amount of $450 million dollars for the people killed and maimed by methyl isocyanate leaked from the Union Carbide factory in the heart of Bhopal three decades ago. In all these years, the poor victims have done everything they could to get justice and compensation. They have cried and died on streets, sat hungry and faced police lathis on roads and filed court cases in the hope that one day they will get justice.

Today, they were denied justice. Today, they were told that they should be happy with the peanuts thrown at them by Union Carbide. Today, India proved once again that it doesn’t care for its poor. Today, it was proved all over again that those who do politics in the name of poor in this country, always rule for the rich.

What justification does CBI have for not being able to produce Warren Anderson in court. The chairman of UC at the time of the gas attack (it was not an accident, the gas leak was caused because of cost-cutting steps taken by him) on the people of Bhopal, Anderson was arrested and later released on bail. He ran off to US in 1986 and we have not been able to find him or ask the US to extradite Anderson to India. Why? The government says it doesn’t know where Anderson is. What a lie. What a shame.

Last year, on a balmy July day, a bunch of victims danced on the streets after hearing news that the Chief Judicial Magistrate of Bhopal had ordered the CBI to arrest Anderson and produce him before the court without delay. The court also asked the CBI to explain what steps it had taken since 2002 to enforce the warrant and extradition of Anderson, who was declared an absconder in 1992. Though the CBI and US government failed to track Anderson, supporters of Bhopal victims traced him to the elite New York neighbourhood of the Hamptons. In 2003, Greenpeace activists paid Anderson a visit at his home and handed him an arrest warrant.

Today’s ridiculous judgment in Bhopal didn’t say anything on Anderson as he is a “proclaimed offender”. This status suits him fine because he doesn’t have to bother about coming to India and answer some very crucial questions:

*Why did Union Carbide not apply the same safety standards at its plant in India as it operated at a sister plant in West Virginia, US?

*On the night of the disaster, why did the six safety measures designed to prevent a gas leak fail to function?

*Why was the safety siren, intended to alert the people living close to the factory, turned off?

The victims have always alleged that Bhopal happened because of negligence by the Union Carbide and that was caused by cost-cutting measures taken by Anderson. Is it because of this reason that Anderson has been 'hiding' in the US?

A criminal has a reason to hide, but what reason does our government have to let a mass murderer like Anderson go scot-free. Is it because he is an American? Can an American come to India kill people in this country and run away with no consequences? That seems to be the case. We are still struggling to get a chance to question David Headley Coleman, an American citizen responsible for the worst terror attack on an Indian city in 2008. Will we succeed in getting Headley extradited to India? No way. Never.

Today, India proved that it doesn’t really care for its people, particularly if they have been slaughtered by powerful people from the most powerful nation in the world. Instead of taking on America and fighting for justice for its poor, India is more than happy to sell its dead cheap.

Rs 1 lakh for every body. Rs 25,000 for every blinded eye. This is the cost of poor life in a failed state.

Bhopal gas tragedy: 8 found guilty, get bail

BHOPAL: The seven Indian Union Carbide India Ltd (UCIL) officials convicted in the 26-year-old Bhopal gas tragedy case have been granted bail and released on submission of a surety of Rs 25,000 by a trial court in Bhopal, according to a Times Now report.

Earlier on Monday, eight accused, one of whom is deceased, were sentenced to two years in prison for causing death due to negligence.

Reacting to the development, representatives of the tragedy's victims and their families who have been protesting outside the court, said they would approach the Madhya Pradesh High Court to allow the slapping of more stringent charges against all those accused in the case.

The Magistrate court in Bhopal on Monday convicted all eight Indians accused in the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy case. A Rs 500,000 fine has been imposed on UCIL.

Toxic gas leak from a Union Carbide pesticide factory in 1984 killed thousands and left an unspecified number battered with diseases and deformity - the toll of victims is still rising.

Despite Monday's conviction, there is little closure for victims. Legal experts have alleged that there was an attempt to cover up the case. It took the CBI three long years to file a chargesheet that many believed was weak. Then in 1996 the charges were watered down making all sections carry the maximum punishment of 2 years.

The charges were also all bailable and with the prime accused in the case - former Union Carbide (USA) chairman Warren Anderson still on the run and unlikely to present himself in Indian court, there is little hope that justice will be served.

Anderson: The man who got away in Bhopal gas case

Chidanand Rajgahtta,

Long before British Petroleum, there was Union Carbide; long before David Headley aka Daood Gilani, there was Warren Anderson.

As legal proceedings in the Bhopal gas tragedy meanders on, its torturous path over 26 years a travesty of justice to many, two principals associated with the disaster have faded from sight even as newer culprits in most recent outrages (BP oil spill and Mumbai's 26/11 massacre) are in the spotlight.

Union Carbide, the American chemical company that became notorious for the world's worst industrial disaster, is now a wholly owned subsidiary of the Dow Chemical Company. And Warren Anderson, Union Carbide CEO, at the time of the disaster and until his retirement in 1986, declared an absconder and a fugitive from justice by an Indian court, lives in relative anonymity and seclusion in Long Island, New York.

Both have washed their hands off the Bhopal disaster. Union Carbide says its officials were not part of this case since the charges were divided long ago into a separate case. "Furthermore, Union Carbide and its officials are not subject to the jurisdiction of the Indian court since they did not have any involvement in the operation of the plant, which was owned and operated by Union Carbide India Ltd, (UCIL)" a spokesman for the company told Wall Street Journal.

The company maintains that the Bhopal plant was designed, owned, operated and managed on a day-to-day basis by UCIL and its employees and all those convicted are the "appropriate people from UCIL — officers and those who actually ran the plant on a daily basis have appeared to face charges."

"I want you to know that Union Carbide continues to have the utmost respect and sympathy for the victims of the tragedy and their families. Union Carbide did all it could to help the victims and their families from Day 1 right up through the settlement with the Indian government," the spokesman added.

Anderson isn't talking. He hasn't spoken on record on the subject for nearly two decades. Now nearing 90, he lives with his wife Lillian in a million-dollar home in the swish Long Island neighbourhood of Bridgehampton, avoiding social contact and hiding from the media and activists who have struggled long to bring him to justice.

When Casey Harrell, a Greenpeace activist, visited his home in 2002 to serve him a warrant, he refused to identify himself and pretended to be someone else.

A neighbour also tried to throw Harrell off-track saying he was someone else and blurting out that he had nothing to do with the Bhopal disaster (even though Harrell hadn't mentioned anything about the disaster).

Bhopal gas case: SC shot down move to slap tough charges

Dhananjay Mahapatra ,

NEW DELHI: It will be unkind to blame the trial court for handing out mild punishments to the Bhopal gas leak accused whose collective negligence caused an industrial catastrophe. For, the court's decision to frame charges against them under Section 304-II of IPC — that attracts a maximum jail term of 10 years — was set aside by the Supreme Court itself on September 13, 1996.

Appearing for CBI, then additional solicitor general Altaf Ahmed had argued before the SC that the accused knew about the potential danger of the lethal gas escaping and hence should be tried under the stringent provision.

"There was ample material produced by the prosecution in support of the chargesheet which indicated that all the accused shared common criminal knowledge about potential danger of escape of the lethal gas — MIC — both on account of the defective plant which was operated under their control and supervision at Bhopal and also on account of the operational shortcomings detected by the Varadarajan expert committee," Ahmed had said in court.

However, a bench comprising then Chief Justice A M Ahmedi and Justice S B Majmudar disagreed. "On our finding that the material pressed in service by the prosecution does not indicate even prima facie that the accused were guilty of an offence of culpable homicide and, therefore, Section 304-II was out of the picture, Section 304-A on this very finding can straightaway get attracted at least prima facie," the bench said. It then quashed the charge framed against the accused under Section 304-II.

As legal experts decried Monday's verdict and activists involved in rehabilitation of the victims termed it a mockery of justice, TOI tracked down Altaf Ahmed in Dubai. Ahmed expressed disappointment, not with the trial court verdict but with the SC's 1996 judgment.

"The dilution of the charges against the accused persons in 1996 by the Supreme Court was very sad and in my perception not justified," he said.

And why did he feel so, when the SC had gone through the evidence and CBI's chargesheet in detail while giving its 40-page judgment? Ahmed felt the apex court had erred by converting the charges from Section 304-II to Section 304A (death caused by a rash and negligent act, under which the BMW hit-and-run accused was tried). "The management of Union Carbide knew that necessary safety measures were not in place and a leak of the kind that resulted in the tragedy was a distinct possibility," he said.

END 25 YEARS OF INJUSTICE TO PEOPLE OF BHOPAL

Shortly before midnight on 2 December 1984, thousands of tonnes of
deadly chemicals leaked from Union Carbide’s pesticide plant in
Bhopal, central India. Around half a million people were exposed.
Between 7,000 and 10,000 people died in the immediate aftermath and a
further 15,000 over the next 20 years.

Nearly 25 years later, the factory site has not been cleaned up. More
than 100,000 people continue to suffer from ongoing health problems.
Efforts to provide rehabilitation – both medical care and measures to
address the socio-economic effects of the leak – have fallen way short
of what is needed.

Many of those affected are still waiting for adequate compensation and
the full facts of the leak and its impact have never been properly
investigated. No one has ever been held to account for what happened
at Bhopal and efforts by survivors’ organizations to use the Indian
and US court systems to see justice done and gain adequate redress
have so far been unsuccessful.

Bhopal is not just a human rights tragedy from the last century – it
is a human rights travesty today. The legacy of Bhopal persists
because the people of Bhopal have never been able to claim their
rights. Moreover, the negative impacts of the leak are affecting new
generations. Studies have shown how the exposure to the toxic gas
causes long-term effects, which can continue in children born in gas-
exposed families.

For 25 years the Indian government has failed the people of Bhopal.
Promises have been repeatedly broken and no adequate action has ever
been taken to address the impacts of the gas leak.

No company can be allowed to evade responsibility for the impacts of
its operations. Union Carbide must be held to account for what
happened at Bhopal. Dow Chemicals, which now owns Union Carbide, must
cooperate fully with the Indian government and the courts in India to
ensure justice is done and the site is fully cleaned up.

BHOPAL GAS TRAGEDY 1984 -Bhopal, India

At the first instance the Government of India failed to ensure that
Union carbide India Limited (U.C.I.L) has installed proper safety
measures and fully implemented it in practice, at it's plant in
Bhopal. The Government of Madhyapradesh through it's labour
department, factory inspectorate & pollution control board failed to
enforce safety practices & environmental protection. In turn, the
U.C.I.L didn't install in full, the safety measures being followed by
it's parent company union carbide corporation (U.C.C) at it's
Various plants in the U.S.A. The U.C.I.L. didn't give community
training to residents of nearby localities, to cope up with
emergencies ie. Industrial accidents. U.C.I.L gave a go - by to safety
practices, as it treated Indian lives as cheap. The government of
Madhya pradesh instead of shifting slum dwellers around U.C.I.L, to
other safe place, gave them legal title deeds just months before the
tragedy in 1984.

Now, refer the following:-

1. After the accident at it's U.C.I.L. plant at Bhopal, India in 1984,
when the U.C.C. Chairman/C.E.O. came over to Bhopal from U.S.A to
visit the accident site, local police arrested him on the charges of
manslaughter. However, the Government of India got him released.

2. In 1985, Government of India enacted "Bhopal claims Act" took- away
the right of appeal of all the Gas tragedy victims & declared itself
as the sole representative of all victims. This said act itself is
violative of victim's fundamental & human rights. The
victims didn't choose Government of India as it's representative under
will, agreement, trust or pleasure.

3. The paradox of this "Bhopal claims Act" is that, Government of
India which is also a party to the crime, tragedy, itself is the
appellant. The appellant (Petitioner),defendant are Government of
India, Prosecution by Government of India & Judged by Government of
India.

4. In 1989, when an appeal about interim compensation to be paid by
the U.C.I.L to all the victims was being heard in the apex court, the
supreme court of India without giving a chance to the victims to make
their point, without consulting them, without making a proper
assessment of damages/losses, gave an arbitrary figure as verdict &
dropped all civil, criminal proceedings against U.C.C.&U.C.I.L

5. In the same year 1989, the Government of India without consulting
the victims of disaster, without making proper assessment of damages/
losses, negotiated a settlement with the U.C.C. and in turn gave full
legal immunity to U.C.C.& U.C.I.L from civil &
Criminal proceedings

After all these crimes, the Government of India failed to distribute
compensation in time to victims. It has failed even to provide safe
drinking water to the residents near the accident site, It has failed
to provide comprehensive medical care to the victims, till
date . It has even failed to get the accident site cleared off toxic
wastes either by the culprit management or by it self, that too after
20 years. The very presence of these toxic wastes since 20 years is
further contaminating, polluting the environment and taking toll of
more victims.

Particularly in the case of "Bhopal Gas Tragedy" the supreme court of
India & Government of India are deadlier criminals than U.C.I.L&U.C.C.

Just consider a case here, Just a few years back an U.S.based M.N.C
ENRON set-up a power project in Maharashtra, India through it's
subsidiary. When Maharashtra state Electricity Board failed to lift
power from Enron& pay them monthly guaranteed revenue, Enron
threatened to invoke, open the "Eschrew Clause" with the Government
of India & to approach international arbiter U.K. Government of India
has stood as conter-guarantee in this case. Finally the Government
paid, of course subsequently the parent ENRON collapsed due to other
reasons. If in this case if Government of India failed to pay-up as a
counter guarantee & refused to comply with the award of International
arbiter, definitely Government of U.S.A. would have stepped into the
scene to protect it's MNC. Hypothetically, In the same vein if Enron
has caused damages to Indians either through negligence of safe
practices or industrial accidents or bank frauds
amounting over and above it's Capital base & insurance cover, then it
would have been the duty of parent Enron & Government of U.S.A. to
step in & pay-up.

Nowadays, it has become routine for central & State ministers to go-
on foreign jaunts, to globe -trott inviting F.D.I/ M.N.Cs to India.
They do sign numerous agreements, only favouring MNC. When tragedies
occur or when they cheat Indian banks/ investors, it is Indians who
suffer. The ministers & bureaucrats thinks themselves as wizards and
enters into agreements with MNCs, industrialists in a hush-hush
manner, with vast scope for possible corruption. Is it not the duty of
government to be transparent ?

An appeal to honourable supreme court of USA & HE Honourable president
of USA Mr.Obama

Your government protects all Americans, all American companies both
inside America & abroad. If an American tourist is murdered in a third
country , American investigators fly over to that country to conduct
investigation in total disregard to local laws. In the same way , if
the interests of an American company is threatened in a third country
American government goes to it's rescue.

However , when an American company butchers , causes mass man
slaughter in a third country , as an American company did in Bhopal
India , no action by American government. Still the said American
company has not removed , cleared the accident site of poisonous
debris at Bhopal India since decades and still causing mass man
slaughter , no action by American government why ?

Some US based companies are selling soft drinks , food products ,
medicines , drugs in third world countries , which are causing grave
health damages to the public. The quality standards of these products
are fit cases of rejections by US FDA. Some US companies are selling
drugs ( which are banned in the USA ) to third world countries , still
us companies are exporting such dangerous medicines , foods to third
countries . no action by US government , why ? is it because you think
that the lives of non Americans are cheaper than Americans ?

Hereby, I do request your kindself ,

1 . to initiate criminal prosecution against US based key management
personnel responsible for Bhopal gas tragedy .

2 . to make either the respective company management or US government
to pay compensation to victims of Bhopal gas tragedy on par with
American lives , as if the same tragedy happened in the USA itself.

3 . to order the management of the said company to clean up Bhopal off
poisonous debris , from the accident site at their own expense.

4 . To legally prosecute US exporters & US based companies selling
products ( which violates US FDA regulations or banned in the USA for
domestic consumption ) to third countries.

WHY MULTINATIONAL COMPANIES ARE INVESTING IN INDIA?

We condemn the brutal massacre by police on farmers – who are going to loss all their lands , sources.of livelihood for the sake of special economic zones , industrial parks , etc in various states of India.

In every mega projects undertaken by government , both the state government & central government have functioned like REAL ESTATE / COMMISSION AGENTS for the rich & mighty . the government says it is acquiring lands for development of industries , for public good. In reality there is only good of rich & mighty.

For forming S.E.Zs , corporates gets speedy single window approvals from government , lands at concessional rates – lower than market value , soft loans from Indian banks , tax exemptions for years from the government , dedicated power supply , etc , from the government . these corporates are even given free hand to raise share capital in the Indian market. the government has enacted flexible labour laws specifically for S.E.Zs , they can hire & fire without bothering to pay gratuity , etc and they are exempted from providing P.F / E.S.I coverage to their employees ie they need not worry about the occupational health hazards of their employees , they can employ them till they are fit & throw them on streets afterwards. These corporates take our own money, employ our own people , use our own natural resources & finally take away the net profits to their home countries – what they give back ? – environmental pollution , tax evasions , low paid occupational hazardous jobs to locals , stock market scams .

During Previous License Regime foreign, investment was not directly welcome in India. As people at that time perceived it as "Neo colonisation" & detested it. There were various restrictions on foreign investments. The local industrialists under monopolistic
environment thrived, who were no way better than day light robberers, of course with a few exception. Under the political patronage, the cunning industrialists looted public money, cheated the government of tax, cheated lending banks & cheated the investors
too. They easily flouted labour laws & made labourers to work in inhuman conditions.

During 1990's under the international pressure India signed GATT & slowly started opening it's economy. Now, from 01/01/05 even product patent has come into force in India. Are MNCs bringing high technology intensive industries to India? No, not at all. They are actually denying sophisticated technologies to India. They are only
bringing the FMCG industries - salt, chips, ketch-up, colas, for which India is a huge home market. They are into services like Hotels, medical care, marketing. In other cases, they are just marketing the products manufactured at their bases in U.S.A. or Europe.

They are not bringing in new production technologies in the areas like space research, nuclear energy, bio-technology, pharmaceuticals or pollution control, to India. Also, some MNCs are relocating their highly polluting industries to India, as they are subjected to stringent environmental protection standards in their own home countries. Whereas, In India the Government is highly corrupt & can be bought for a price. The attractive points for foreign direct investment (FDI) in India are,

1. There is lack of comprehensive environmental norms.

2. The enforcement of environmental norms is lax.

3. The cost of health coverage, social security net to be provided to the workers exposed to the occupational hazards is less.

4. The cost of compensation to be paid to the persons-who died or suffered damages due to occupational hazards/environmental pollution is meager.

5. The enforcement of labour laws are lax.

6. Public money can be easily raised through lending Banks, primary market within India & the public can be easily cheated.

7. The tax can be evaded through various loopholes like transferring money to holding companies situated at Mauritius or countries which have double taxation avoidance agreement with India.

8. The tax can be evaded, company money can be cheated by lending money to sister / holding concerns at low interest rates or by selling shares, materials to their private companies at low rates or by buying shares, materials from their holding/sister concerns at exhorbitant rates, etc.

9. The corporate governance laws are almost absent in India & it's enforcement nil.

10. Above all, the time can be bought by very slow Indian legal system, if any dispute arise.

11. On top of it, well trained, technically qualified people are available at low rates through contractors.

Just consider the following cases which highlight the apathy, irresponsibility of government of India and emboldened the cunning, MNCs:-

1. The India which boasts of so much scientific/technological advancements, is till date has been unable to provide potable water to it's people. People of west Bengal , Karnataka , Andrapradesh states are forced to drink Arsenic, Fluoride poisoned water.

2. The people living near the mines of R.E.M.P. in Kerala are suffering due to exposure to the radio active materials, Same is the case with the people of Jadaguda, Jharkhand, living near the U.C.I.L. plant. Both M/S R.E.M.P & M/s U.C.I.L are department of atomic energy enterprises.

3. Few years back, In Mysore railway station containers of radio- active materials were left unattended. The dome of reactor building at construction stage collapsed in nuclear power plant at Kaiga. A fire tragedy occurred in Kakrapar nuclear power plant. In the recent Tsunami waves onslaught, certain important facilities of Koodakulam atomic plant were damaged near Chennai.

4. In 1984, U.S. based MNC union carbide mass murdered nearly 20,000 people, injured lakhs who are still suffering health problems. The polluted poisonous accident site i.e. Union carbide plant in Bhopal is not yet cleared off toxic materials even after 20 years.
This is still further damaging the residents of Bhopal.

5. In the above union carbide disaster, the Government of India didn't present the case properly before supreme courts of India & U.S.A.. As a result the MNC just paid a pittance as compensation. As per that the cost of Indian lives are just a fraction of cost of
American lives. Just imagine if a same disaster occurred in U.S.A. at the plant of a MNC headquartered in India, what would have been the consequence?

6. In India, hazardous chemicals laced with food additives are passed through the drinks, beverages like pepsi, cola, coco cola very easily.

7. The medicines like nimesulide, paracetamol, etc. with hazardous side effects which are banned in U.S.A.& Europe, are easily marketed by the same U.S.& Europe based MNCs in India.

8. In India spurious drugs, medicines, food stuffs are easily marketed.

9. In India, the clinical trials of new medicines under research are done without proper compensation structure to those being tried upon ie. Virtual guinea pigs.

10. In India, the genetically engineered BT crops are being introduced without paying attention to formers, ecology or eco-system.

11. In India, during setting up of large projects, scant attention is paid to environment, eco-system & the displaced persons.

Most of the times, in government projects itself the displaced persons are cheated by the government in numerous ways.

12. In India, various Government as well as private hospitals dumps hospital wastes with deadly viruses in the open, with scant regard to public health.

13. In India, aged ships belonging to foreign countries are breaked down to scrap in ship breaking yards of Gujarath , Maharashtra & AP. Various toxins like the Asbestos, lead, etc & the hazardous, dirty water, Oil inside the ship are drained into Indian seashore. The labourers here are forced to work without any safety gears.

14. When specific cases of human rights violations were brought before the government & Judiciary by us , both of them didn't respond at all.

All the above cases highlight the fact that, government of India & Indian judiciary treats it's citizens lives as cheap, dispensable at will. This is the major attracting force for MNCs to India.

BHOPAL GAS TRAGEDY 1984 -Bhopal, India

At the first instance the Government of India failed to ensure that Union carbide India Limited (U.C.I.L) has installed proper safety measures and fully implemented it in practice, at it's plant in Bhopal. The Government of Madhyapradesh through it's labour
department, factory inspectorate & pollution control board failed to enforce safety practices & environmental protection. In turn, the U.C.I.L didn't install in full, the safety measures being followed by it's parent company union carbide corporation (U.C.C) at it's
Various plants in the U.S.A. The U.C.I.L. didn't give community training to residents of nearby localities, to cope up with emergencies ie. Industrial accidents. U.C.I.L gave a go - by to safety practices, as it treated Indian lives as cheap. The government of Madhya pradesh instead of shifting slum dwellers around U.C.I.L, to other safe place, gave them legal title deeds just months before the tragedy in 1984.

Now, refer the following:-

1. After the accident at it's U.C.I.L. plant at Bhopal, India in 1984, when the U.C.C. Chairman/C.E.O. came over to Bhopal from U.S.A to visit the accident site, local police arrested him on the charges of manslaughter. However, the Government of India got him released.

2. In 1985, Government of India enacted "Bhopal claims Act" took- away the right of appeal of all the Gas tragedy victims & declared itself as the sole representative of all victims. This said act itself is violative of victim's fundamental & human rights. The
victims didn't choose Government of India as it's representative under will, agreement, trust or pleasure.

3. The paradox of this "Bhopal claims Act" is that, Government of India which is also a party to the crime, tragedy, itself is the appellant. The appellant (Petitioner),defendant are Government of India, Prosecution by Government of India & Judged by Government of
India.

4. In 1989, when an appeal about interim compensation to be paid by the U.C.I.L to all the victims was being heard in the apex court, the supreme court of India without giving a chance to the victims to make their point, without consulting them, without making a proper assessment of damages/losses, gave an arbitrary figure as verdict & dropped all civil, criminal proceedings against U.C.C.&U.C.I.L

5. In the same year 1989, the Government of India without consulting the victims of disaster, without making proper assessment of damages/ losses, negotiated a settlement with the U.C.C. and in turn gave full legal immunity to U.C.C.& U.C.I.L from civil &
Criminal proceedings

6. Even the Government of India didn't present the case of victim's-gas tragedy victims, properly before the U.S.courts, where the U.C.C is based. All these premeditated acts only benefited the criminals- U.C.C&UCIL. Are not the supreme court of India & Government of India, here to safeguard Indians and to safeguard Justice?

After all these crimes, the Government of India failed to distribute compensation in time to victims. It has failed even to provide safe drinking water to the residents near the accident site, It has failed to provide comprehensive medical care to the victims, till
date . It has even failed to get the accident site cleared off toxic wastes either by the culprit management or by it self, that too after 20 years. The very presence of these toxic wastes since 20 years is further contaminating, polluting the environment and taking toll of more victims.

Particularly in the case of "Bhopal Gas Tragedy" the supreme court of India & Government of India are deadlier criminals than U.C.I.L&U.C.C.

Just consider a case here, Just a few years back an U.S.based M.N.C ENRON set-up a power project in Maharashtra, India through it's subsidiary. When Maharashtra state Electricity Board failed to lift power from Enron& pay them monthly guaranteed revenue, Enron threatened to invoke, open the "Eschrew Clause" with the Government
of India & to approach international arbiter U.K. Government of India has stood as conter-guarantee in this case. Finally the Government paid, of course subsequently the parent ENRON collapsed due to other reasons. If in this case if Government of India failed to pay-up as a counter guarantee & refused to comply with the award of International arbiter, definitely Government of U.S.A. would have stepped into the scene to protect it's MNC. Hypothetically, In the same vein if Enron has caused damages to Indians either through negligence of safe practices or industrial accidents or bank frauds
amounting over and above it's Capital base & insurance cover, then it would have been the duty of parent Enron & Government of U.S.A. to step in & pay-up.

In the same way, the U.C.I.L has caused massive damages to Indians & refusing to pay commensurate to damages. Dow chemicals which took- over U.C.C. is also refusing to pay. DOW chemicals which is the new owner of U.C.C. naturally inherits both profits, credits lent & liabilities to pay of U.C.C. Still it is refusing to pay. Now it is the turn of Government of U.S.A. to cough-up the sum.

Nowadays, it has become routine for central & State ministers to go- on foreign jaunts, to globe -trott inviting F.D.I/ M.N.Cs to India. They do sign numerous agreements, only favouring MNC. When tragedies occur or when they cheat Indian banks/ investors, it is Indians who suffer. The ministers & bureaucrats thinks themselves as wizards and enters into agreements with MNCs, industrialists in a hush-hush manner, with vast scope for possible corruption. Is it not the duty of government to be transparent ?

Bhopal gas case: ex-CBI men, Moily fight verbal war as Warren Anderson goes scot-free

New Delhi: Bhopal gas tragedy prime accused Warren Anderson’s failed extradition has kicked off a war of words between former CBI investigators and the law minister.

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SCRAP Koodankulam & Jaitapur Nuclear Power Projects

2012-01-10T04:28:00.001-08:00

S.O.S - e - Clarion Of Dalit - Weekly Newspaper On Web

Working For The Rights & Survival Of The Oppressed

Editor: NAGARAJ.M.R… VOL.6 issue. 3…… 18/01/2012

“There is a higher court than the court of justice and that is the court of conscience It supercedes all other courts. ”
- Mahatma Gandhi

Editorial : SCRAP Jaitapur & Koodankulam Nuclear Power Projects

- A B C D of Denocracy – A Lesson for all people’s representatives

HOW MPs ,MLAs , Ministers - PEOPLE’S REPRESENTATIVES MUST FUNCTION
People are the kings , self rulers in a democracy . Peoples representatives must just represent the wishes , aspirations of people. When people in Jaitapur , Maharashtra state & Koodankulam , Tamilnadu state of India are totally against a nuke plant in their area and they don’t want it , still the authorities are forcing this project over their head.
Since 65 years of independence , In India the learned IAS babus & Netas are forcing their agendas , SEZs , Projects over the people for their own selfish gains , against the wishes of people. This is not DEMOCRACY.

In india, indirect democracy is the form of governance. In this
form, people's representatives are bound to raise the questions ,
issues concerning their constituents on their behalf , on the floor of
the house. However the sad part in india even after 65 years of
democracy , is the lobbying is at it's peak. The lobbying is a
gentleman's white collared crook's way of forming favour seeker's
group , creating a corpus to pay lumpsum bribe & influencing decision
making.
The people's representatives are bound to represent their people
first , then their party & party think tanks. India has come to this
sorry state of affairs , widespread corruption , huge black economy &
rampant poverty, all due to inefficient legislations & enforcements.
These think tanks & IAS lobby, consider themselves as most super
brains on earth & gives out suggestions . the present state of affairs
is a barometer of their brilliance. These think tanks & IAS lobby are
the hand maidens of lobbyists / bribers.

Now consider the following example :
Mr.raj gandhi is a member of parliament from mandya constituency in
karnataka state. He is a MBA graduate & member of ruling indian
progressive party. The multinational giant M/S GREY HOUND CORPORATION
wants to enter into paper manufacturing business in india. It's sight
falls on the public sector paper giant mandya national paper mills (
MNPM) in mandya district of karnataka. The MNC effectively lobbies
with the government. The ruling party think tank & the cabinet
advisory group recommends to the government to make strategic
disinvestment in the PSU M/S MNPM. They bring out graph with full
power point presentation stating that it is good for the company as
well as the government. The lobbyists follows it up with media reports
on the positive aspect of strategic disinvestment. A favourable
impression is created in the minds of literate public. The cabinet
committee okays it.

The " strategic dis investment issue " comes before the parliament
for legislation / approval. The ruling party issues a party whip to
it's members to vote in favour of dis investment. However M.P mr.raj
gandhi who is an MBA in his own wisdom also favours the dis
investment. However ,most importantly the constituents – people in
mandya parliamentary constituency through protest marches , mass post
card campaigns lakhs in numbers expresses their disagreement with the
dis investment & urges their MP mr.gandhi to vote against the
disinvestment legislation.

On the D-day in parliament , mr. Raj gandhi as per his party whip &
his own wisdom votes in favour of strategic disinvestment legislation,
much against the wishes of his people , constituents & mis represents
them in parliament. the democracy has failed here. in This way
democracy is being derailed since 62 years in india.

In democracy, party whip , MP or MLA's own wisdom / brilliance,
think tank & IAS lobby recommendations are all secondary , the
constituent's of his constituency , people's wishes aspirations are
of primary importance & supreme. What people need is a honest
representative, who simply delivers the people's aspirations on the
floor of the house back & forth , without superimposing it with his
own ideas & party ideas. For true democracy , the people's
representatives must be true postmans.

Towards this end , the people must be educated about their
democratic rights & responsibilities. This is an appeal to the honest
few in the parliament & state legislatures to weed out their corrupt
colleagues , lobbyists, to uphold the dignity of the house & to
install democracy in it's true form.

Hereby , we do request the Honorable Chief Minister of Maharashtra state to immediately , scrap Jaitapur Nuclear Power Project. Jai Hind. Vande Mataram.

Your’s sincerely,

Nagaraj M R

Fukushima Nuclear Accident: Sobering Reflections
By S.G.Vombatkere

13 March, 2011
Countercurrents.org

The tsunami-triggered accident in Fukushima (Japan) Daiichi plant's Unit 1 (operated by the Tokyo Electric Power Company, TEPCO) brings safety issues into question regarding the operation of nuclear power plants (NPPs). In the Daiichi NPP, the automatic shutting down of the reactor by stopping the controlled nuclear fission process, did occur as designed. However, the reactor did not cool down as fast as it was expected and required to do, and called for activating the emergency coolant pumps according to design. But there was no grid power due to a combination of earthquake and subsequent tsunami to operate the pumps. Also, because of flooding due to the tsunami, the dedicated standby generators could not provide power. The standby battery power (standby to the standby generator) was insufficient to operate the pumps at sufficient rate and duration, and so the (radioactive) steam generated due to overheating had to be vented to relieve the increasing pressure. This has put an unmeasured quantum of radioactive elements (radionucleides) into the atmosphere. But that too did not cool down the reactor sufficiently. It was then reported that sea water was being let into the reactor to cool it to prevent a meltdown. By this a further unmeasured amount of radioactive material would be discharged into the environment. The TEPCO website claims that “monitoring goes on around the clock year round” but at the bottom it says in red: “THIS SYSTEM IS CURRENTLY SHUTDOWN". All this detail is provided to show three things: One, that accidents in NPPs can and do occur for one or more of several reasons; Two, monitoring can fail, and even when it operates, the public is expected to unquestioningly accept the data provided by the NPP authorities as correct, due to official secrecy conditions. Thus, how much of nuclear radiation has already been discharged into the atmosphere and sea water from the Daiichi NPP and how much more will escape in the hours and days to come will never be known. Also, how much is being discharged from the other four affected NPPs is anybody's guess; Three, Unlike hydel or thermal power plants which can be shut down practically instantaneously, the nuclear fuel in NPPs requires cooling to prevent overheating even in normal conditions. Thus, NPPs always need independent power supply (from the grid or their own standby generators) in an emergency. That is, NPPs are not autonomous in respect of safety.
The Japanese nuclear engineers are making heroic efforts at immense personal risk to prevent a steam explosion (not a nuclear explosion) in the NPP. This is the point at which the design and construction standards of the concrete double containment structure of the nuclear reactor will have to withstand the explosion. This could trigger a partial or total meltdown of the reactor core, similar to what happened in USA in 1971 in the Three Mile Island NPP. (This put the US nuclear power industry into the doldrums until USA revived it by negotiating the nuclear deal with India in 2009). Japan has a reputation for good design and safety standards and good quality control and quality assurance in execution. It would be the fervent wish of every thinking person on the planet that the double containment will not fail and that the engineers will control the desperately delicate situation in the Daiichi NPP. Nobody is as yet even thinking of the costs of containing the accident and the subsequent nuclear clean-up.
But let us now cut to the nuclear situation in India. The issue of Indian design and construction quality standards stands naked when we note that the concrete containment dome of the Kaiga (Karnataka) NPP collapsed when under construction, and had to be rebuilt. It has not been revealed whether it was a failure of design or execution quality. It is not possible to obtain reliable information regarding the operation, safety standards and performance or other cost, constructional or operational aspects of any NPP because of the following reasons: One, Section 18 (Restriction on disclosure of information) and Section 24 (Offences and penalties) of the draconian Indian Atomic Energy Act 1962, do not permit anybody to even ask questions about NPPs, Two, nobody except the nuclear industry is permitted to conduct tests for radioactivity even outside the perimeter of any NPP, Three, the Environment Protection Act 1986, does not apply to NPPs, Four, the safety and monitoring agency (AERB) is not an independent agency and the public has to accept whatever health and safety information is released by the NPP or the AERB, Five, the budget of the DAE is not placed even before Parliament and the power generation and efficiency figures are not available even to the Central Electricity Authority (CEA). In short, the Indian nuclear industry is a closed door to the rest of India, and this can be at the cost of public safety and health.
Further, in the event of a nuclear accident, Government of India (GoI) has sought to cap or limit the liability of operators or suppliers of nuclear hardware and technology to assure profits to the US nuclear industry. In simpler language, this means that the real financial cost of post-accident nuclear clean-up and repair would be borne by India, as the liability of the suppliers would be limited to the cap amount, while the real costs of health and livelihood would be borne by the people.
In view of the secrecy and the poor standards of construction even in the nuclear industry, the conflicting parameters of safety, operational cost and radioactive emissions of any NPP leave the public to guess when one of India's NPPs may suffer a serious accident, and whether we will be able to handle the disaster effectively and efficiently. Indian nuclear engineers are second to none, thus the issue of safety in India's nuclear establishment is institutional. The secrecy, intransparency, unaccountability and self-certification of the nuclear industry makes one doubt whether we will be able to prevent serious emergency or handle it effectively should it happen.
This also raises questions about the advisability of going for mega NPPs such as planned in Jaitapur, Maharashtra. This is quite apart from the fact of enormous resistance to its construction from local people on the grounds of livelihood and environment. Let us hope that the Indian nuclear establishment would never need to handle a serious accident of the type of Three Mile Island or Chernobyl or Fukushima.
S.G.Vombatkere holds a PhD in civil structural dynamics from I.I.T, Madras, and has extensive structural design and project execution experience.
E-mail: sg9kere@live.com

Children crippled by India's uranium waste
The Guardian - Asia Pacific - 23Aug

An Observer investigation has discovered a link between Indian electricity stations and physical and mental abnormalities

Hundreds of children in the Punjab have been contaminated with uranium in a pollution scandal with implications that could extend far beyond the borders of India.

Scientists and health workers have sounded the alarm after being confronted with a dramatic rise in birth defects, physical and mental abnormalities, and cancers in the Indian state. A subsequent Observer investigation has uncovered evidence linking the contamination to ash from the region's coal-fired power stations. Tests on children born in areas around the power stations have revealed that many have high levels of uranium in their bodies.

The metal is concentrated in the fly ash produced when coal is burned. Tests on ground water around the plants show levels of uranium up to 15 times the World Health Organisation's maximum safe limits.

The revelations coincide with the publication of a report by the Russian Academy of Sciences' Thermal Engineering journal that warns of an increased radiation hazard to people living near coal-fired thermal power stations.

Staff at two clinics around the Punjabi city of Bathinda â€" where there are two coal-fired thermal plants â€" have reported alarming numbers of admissions of severely handicapped children. Children were born with enlarged or small heads, short arms and legs, cerebral palsy, Down's syndrome and other complications. A German laboratory that tested samples taken from the children found massive levels of uranium in their bodies â€" in one case more than 60 times the maximum safe limit.

Studies of ground water suggest that while the uranium contamination is heaviest around the power plants, it extends across large parts of the state, which is home to 24 million people. The Indian government is committed to an expansion of thermal plants in Punjab and other states. Around the world, many other countries are planning to build new coal-fired power plants, including China, Russia, India, Germany and the United States. In the UK, there are plans for a coal-fired station at the Kingsnorth facility in Kent.

The children are being treated at the Baba Farid centres for special children in Bathinda and nearby Faridkot. Dr Pritpal Singh, who is in charge of the Faridkot clinic, said the number of children affected had risen dramatically in the past six or seven years and claimed the authorities were determined to bury the scandal. "They can't just detoxify these kids, they have to detoxify the whole Punjab. That is the reason for their reluctance," he said.

"They threatened us and said if we didn't stop commenting on what's happening they would close our clinic. But I decided that if I kept silent it would go on for years and no one would do anything about it. If I keep silent then the next day it will be my child. The children are dying in front of me."

Dr Carin Smit, a South African clinical metal toxicologist who arranged for the tests to be carried out, said the situation could not be ignored. "There is evidence of harm for these children in my care and â€¦ it is an imperative that their bodies be cleaned up and their metabolism be supported to deal with such a devastating presence of radioactive material," she said.

"If the contamination is as widespread as it would appear to be â€" as far west as Muktsar on Pakistan's border, and as far east as spreading into the foothills of Himachal Pradesh â€" then millions are at high risk and every new baby born to a contaminated mother is at risk."

A team of scientists from India's Department of Atomic Energy visited the area and reported that while the concentration of uranium in drinking water was "slightly high", there was "nothing to worry about", although some of their tests recorded levels of uranium as high as 224micrograms per litre (mcg/l) â€" 15 times higher than the safe level of 15mcg/l recommended by the World Health Organisation. The US Environmental Protection Agency sets a maximum safe level of 20mcg/l. Scientists in Punjab who have studied the presence of uranium in the state have dismissed the government's denials as a whitewash.

Dr Chander Parkash and Dr Surinder Singh, both from Amritsar's Guru Nanak Dev University, said it was clear that uranium was present in large quantities in the ground water and should be investigated further.

In the Faridkot centre last week, 15-year-old Harmanbir Kaur's test results came back and showed she had 10 times the safe limit in her body. Her brother, Naunihal Singh, six, had double the safe levels.

Harmanbir was born in Muktsar, 40km from Faridkot. Her mother, Kulbir Kaur, 37, has watched her child slowly degenerate from a healthy baby into the very ill girl she is today â€" dribbling constantly, unable to feed herself and lost in a world of her own.

"God knows what sin I have committed. When we go to our village people say there is a curse of God on you, but I don't believe so," she said. "Every part of this area is affected. We never imagined that there would be uranium in our kids."

A few miles down the road in Bathinda, Sukhminder Singh, a 48-year-old farmer, watched his son Kulwinder, 13, staring into space while curling his hands under his chin. The tests showed that Kulwinder had 19 times the maximum safe level of uranium in his body. He has cerebral palsy and has already had seven operations to unbend his arms and legs. He is furious that the government has ignored the evidence of a serious health risk to children in the Punjab.

"The government should investigate it because if our child is affected it will also affect future generations," he said. "What are they waiting for? How many children do they want to be affected? Another generation?"

Doni Choudhary, aged 15 months, is waiting to be tested, although staff say he shows similar symptoms to children whose results have revealed dangerous levels of uranium, and he is already being treated for suspected uranium poisoning. His mother, Neelum, 22, from the state capital, Chandigarh, says he was born with hydrocephaly â€" water on the brain. His legs are useless.

"He is dependent on others. After me, who can care for him?" Neelum says. "He tries to speak but he can't express himself and my heart cries. When will he understand that his legs don't work? What will he feel?"

Some scientists have also proposed that ground water may have been contaminated by contact with granite lying deep below the thick alluvial deposits that form the Punjab plains, although the parents of most of the children affected say they take their water from the mains supply, which comes from other sources.

Meanwhile, smoke continues to pour from Faridkot's power station chimneys and lorries shuttle backwards and forwards, taking away the fly ash to be mixed into cement at the Ambuja factory next to the Bathinda power plant.

Inside the plant last week, there was ash everywhere, forming drifts, clinging to the skin, getting into the throat. In the main hall, the LED display showed the four generators are churning out 107 megawatts of electricity.

Ravindra Singh, the plant's security officer, said that most of the ash went to the cement works, while the rest was dumped in ash ponds. The first coal-fired power station in Punjab was commissioned in Bathinda in 1974. It was followed by another in nearby Lehra Mohabbat in 1998. There is a third to the east, at Ropar.

Tests on ground water in villages in Bathinda district found the highest average concentration of uranium â€" 57mcg/l, three times the EPA's safe limit â€" in the town of Bhucho Mandi, a short distance from the Lehra Mohabbat ash pond. This level of uranium means the lifetime cancer risk in the village is more than 150 times that of the normal population

JAITAPUR NUCLEAR PLANT - IMPACT

A Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) report has criticised the location of the Jaitapur nuclear power plant in the Ratnagiri district of Maharashtra as sitting on an earthquake zone even as the state government plans to hold a public discussion to clear the air for the proposed reactor. Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan plans to rope in atomic energy experts and representatives of the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL), which will set up the project in collaboration with Areva, a French company, to dispel the “misinformation” created by activists at a public discussion in January. The project will have six 1650 MW reactors to be commissioned in a phased manner from 2018.

An impact assessment report by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) has strongly criticised the nuclear power plant being proposed at Jaitapur in the Konkan region.

The report has indicated that the project - which requires about 968 hectares of land panning five villages - will have a huge negative impact on the social as well as environmental development of not just these villages and the surrounding areas, but also on the Konkan region in general.

The findings suggest that the government subverted facts and called fertile agricultural land barren. It also says that the Jaitapur project is sitting on a high to moderate severity earthquake zone.

The Jaitapur nuclear power complex is located in the ecologically sensitive coastal Maharashtra region which includes Raigad, Sindhudurg and Ratnagiri districts. Nuclear Power Corporation of India is building the 9900 megawatt power plant - said to be the world's largest - in collaboration with French nuclear designing firm Areva. Last month, the Union Environment Ministry gave a conditional go-ahead to the plant. However, it is facing staunch opposition from the locals who fear environmental degradation in the fragile Konkan area.

Maharashtra Congress team heads to Jaitapur

As farmers' protests boil over in Ratnagiri threatening to delay the Jaitapur nuclear power plant, a concerned Maharashtra government dispatched a Congress team to review the situation.

"A Congress committee is going to Jaitapur. The committee will talk to locals and fishermen there. We will listen to their views and problems," Maharashtra Congress chief Manikrao Thakre said.

Despite the Environment Ministry's conditional go-ahead to the plant, protests refuse to die down.

"People who have faced the effects of a nuclear power project in their vicinity told us that this is a devastating project. They said that our next generation will have nothing to live and survive on. We will lose our paddy fields, our plantations and orchards and we will die of hunger," said Umakant Kambli, a resident of Madban village, Ratnagiri.

"We will die but won't let this project come up," said Manda Laxman Wadekar, former Sarpanch.

There is a sense of mistrust against the government. People here say they were not taken into confidence regarding the project, their lands were forcefully taken away, and their democratic protests were illegally thwarted.

Experts have already said that building, safeguarding and providing imported fuel to the reactor will be so costly that power from Jaitapur will be unaffordable.

Now villagers allege the project has neither planned storage and disposal of its nuclear waste, nor drafted any plan to ecologically protect Ratnagiri - a region of rich agriculture, horticulture, fisheries and biodiversity.

Without these plans in place, they say, letting the project come up will be suicidal.

WHY JAITAPUR NUCLEAR PLANT MUST BE OPPOSED

Citizens are demanding answers to questions regarding approval, rehabilitation and land acquisition, costs, radioactive byproducts, reprocessing of spent fuel and disposal of radioactive wastes and civil nuclear liability limits of the Jaitapur nuclear plant that remains unaddressed. It must be answered by the Indian government, says activist Gopal Krishna.
Madban, a small village in Ratnagiri, Maharashtra [ Images ] is opposed to the nuclear plant in Jaitapur proposed by the Department of Atomic Energy, Government of India [ Images ]. The project got environmental clearance on November 28 hurriedly to please French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who visted India from December 4-7. The nuclear reactors would be designed and developed by AREVA, a French company.
Prior to this on October 29, more than 3,000 villagers courted arrest after an agitation. The villagers have refused compensation. Former high court judge B G Kolse-Patil, who was served orders preventing him from entering Ratnagiri district, flouted the ban and attended the villagers rally. Former Indian Navy chief Admiral L Ramdas (retired) and former Supreme Court Judge P B Samant too supported the villagers but were stopped by the police from joining the agitation.
The proposed nuclear power park at Madban is situated near the port of Jaitapur in the southern part of Ratnagiri district. It would be the largest single location nuclear power project in the world. It is based on the import of six nuclear power plants from AREVA. In the first phase, two plants are to be built between 2012 and 2017.
It has come to light that in the matter of the Jaitapur Nuclear Power Project a rigorous and scientific environment impact assessment and cost benefit analysis has not been performed.
Union Minister of Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh [ Images ], in the presence of the chief minister and deputy chief minister of Maharashtra officially announced 'conditional' environmental clearance to the JNPP. The citizens of Maharashtra and India are demanding answers to questions regarding approval, rehabilitation and land acquisition, costs, radioactive byproducts, reprocessing of spent fuel and disposal of radioactive wastes and civil nuclear liability limits that remains unaddressed. It must be answered by the Indian government. It is widely felt that it is a Vedanta and Posco kind of clearance given in haste to be repented in leisure.
It appears that the preparations for Sarkozy occupied the Union Cabinet so much that it failed to consult the secretaries of ministries/departments of the government of India on the ramifications in terms of liability from the proposed nuclear plant.
Several organisations and a large number of individuals are campaigning against the plant. The Konkan Bachao Samiti and the Janhit Seva Samiti have been spearheading a campaign against this nuclear power project. There is reliable information that the European regulatory authorities from three countries, Finland, France [ Images ] and UK have jointly written to AREVA, raising certain serious objections to the current design of control and instrumentation for vital safety aspects of Evolutionary Pressurized Reactors plant. It has also been learnt that the US regulator has written to AREVA expressing similar concerns.
Local residents are opposed to the JNPP and have refused to accept any compensation, nor have they demanded a raise in compensation. The project will attract Rs 25,000 crore to Rs 35,000 crore investment in the first two phases. The government is offering Rs 350 crore as compensation to the villagers. It is claimed that there are 2,033 families who would be directly affected by the project on 968 hectares of land. The nuclear project promises power generation of 9,900 MW in phases.
In a backdrop that presented a fait accompli, the biodiversity report prepared by the Bombay Natural History Society formed the basis for the 35 environmental conditions set by the environment ministry while giving the green signal for the nuclear plant. The report recorded the presence of plant and animal life on land and marine both at and around the plant site. The BNHS has also mapped 407 hectares of mangrove vegetation around a 10 km radius of the nuclear plant as well as in some of the affected villages.
The BNHS report contradicted the official 1,200 page environment impact assessment report prepared by the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute and made public in April, 2010.
The NEERI report had described the land surrounding the nuclear plant as "rocky and barren land with no habitation and vegetation" and hence ruled out any adverse ecological impact in the area. The same area was surveyed during the monsoon by BNHS, which found 134 species of plants on the plateau.
In July, 2010 the BNHS conducted a rapid impact assessment of the biodiversity of the region and found the Madban plateau to be rich in plant and animal diversity with very good marine diversity in adjacent sites of Ambolgad and Kasheli.
The BNHS found 1,000 plant species, NEERI couldn't find even 500 species. Indeed if the project proponents are assigned to conduct EIA, the report cannot be objective. Therefore, once again the NEERI report is flawed. The Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited, the project proponent, is an undertaking of the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE had commissioned NEERI to prepare the EIA report for the Jaitapur plant in 2005).
Earlier, in a letter to the President of India dated September 1, ToxicsWatch Alliance pointed out that "the cost of a single nuclear reactor can be as high as Rs 30,000 crore as in the case of the reactor planned at Jaitapur by AREVA, a French public multinational industrial conglomerate headquartered in Tour Areva near Paris. Consequently, the cost of a reactor can be 20 times the maximum amount of liability. It means that it might be cheaper for the operator to take the risk of paying the maximum liability than to spend, say, 10 per cent extra in adding safety features to the plant."
It has been found that NEERI's EIA report is unscientific. This EIA report was made available only a month prior to the public hearing on May 16. It has been alleged on factual grounds that the EIA report reads as if it was authored by the public relations department of NPCIL or Areva.
It may be noted, "The accident at Chernobyl released into the atmosphere an amount of radioactivity equivalent to 400 bombs of the Hiroshima variety. The nuclear project at Jaitapur is about 10 times the size of the Chernobyl Power Plant. The huge radioactive accumulations at the plant site are the principal causes of concern which must be addressed."
NEERI did not have the competence to assess the project. It entails issues of radioactive radiation. NEERI contends that the project meets Atomic Energy Regulatory Board norms and standards without conducting any independent assessment, relying completely on the AERB. But AERB reports are not part of the EIA.
Unmindful of its admitted incompetence to assess radioactive risk, NEERI certifies the safety of the plant saying, "Through individual event sequence analysis for different initiating events, it is estimated that the plant is provided adequate safety features and measures to mitigate or minimise any unsafe consequences".
The same EIA report reveals the following, "All the above scenarios explained, namely Design Basis Accidents and Beyond Design Basis Accidents are thoroughly studied and detailed reports are generated as Preliminary Safety Analysis Reports and these reports will be submitted to Atomic Energy Regulatory Board for review and approval for construction of nuclear power project at Jaitapur." Clearly implying that the safety approval by the AERB is yet to be obtained and despite this it certified the adequacy of the safety of the plant against "any unsafe consequences".
The threat of a terrorist attack on nuclear plants in India is also considered credible is clear from the specific exclusion in clause 5 (ii) in the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill (2010) which has been passed by the Indian Parliament and awaits the President's assent. It reads: "An operator shall not be liable for any nuclear damage where such damage is caused by a nuclear incident directly due to -- an act of armed conflict, hostility, civil war, insurrection or terrorism".
After the 9/11 terrorist attack in the US, the possibility of terrorist attacks on nuclear power plants is considered quite credible and substantial by US authorities. The DAE has ignored the complete text of a 2009 report presented to the US Congress: on "Nuclear Power Plant Security and Vulnerabilities". Consequently, amendments were made in US law to require nuclear plant design to address this risk but the Indian legislation on nuclear liability does the contrary.
In his testimony to the parliamentary committee, Union Defence Secretary Pradeep Kumar categorically had stated, "under different layers of protection, nuclear assets including nuclear installations are being protected through defence." However, he admitted that "absolute and foolproof protection cannot be guaranteed for any nuclear or other assets in the country during peace or war."
Exceptions for acts of terrorism can easily be used by the supplier and the operator to wash their hands off any nuclear disaster. Testimony after testimony before the parliamentary committee had asked for deletion of the word terrorism from the nuclear liability bill but the same is not reflected in the bill which was passed by Parliament.
Misplaced expression of satisfaction by NEERI with NPCIL's claim of safe storage for 100 years is shocking. This constitutes less than one per cent of the lethality lifetime of the spent fuel. There is no explanation as what will happen to the radioactive waste after 100 years. It is a known fact that India does not have a geological repository for nuclear waste and there are no sites in India suitable for building one.
The EIA report is flawed because of the absence of a specific plan for decommissioning as well. No new nuclear plant can be built in Europe or the US without such a plan. The EIA report is untenable.
The cost of electricity generated from JNPP would be in excess of Rs 9 per unit. This does not include the costs of managing radioactive waste and decommissioning. The current cost of electricity is about Rs 4 per unit. It has been noted in the Rajya Sabha that as far as the cost difference between hydro, thermal and all the available options vis-à-vis nuclear electricity is concerned, the cost difference is 1:3.
If the overall objective of wanting to generate 40,000 MW of nuclear power in the next two decades is considered, the cost difference between conventional and nuclear electricity would be more than Rs 300,000 crore. This amount can build 20,000 hundred-bedded modern hospitals all over the country and 2.5 lakhs of Navodaya Vidyalayas with boarding facilities for 100 students all over the country.
The total installed generating capacity in India as on June 30 was 162,367 MW, comprising 64 percent from fossil fuel, 23 percent from hydro, 3 percent from nuclear and balance 10 percent from renewable energy sources. Evidently, share of nuclear power is quite low. It is possible to generate similar power from alternate sources of energy.
In its last report in 2010, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Science, Technology, Environment & Forests, had recommended that "the government should consult all such ministries/departments which are even remotely concerned with the provisions of a proposed legislation", the same has not been done. This recommendation has been ignored in the case of Jaitapur nuclear plant as well.
The standing committee referred to how secretaries of ministries of health & family welfare, agriculture, labour & employment, food & public distribution were ignored in the drafting of the Nuclear Liability Bill was a very serious lapse of the Union Cabinet.
It may be noted that secretary, Union ministry of health said, "Since the response system to deal with any kind of emergency of such type, the hospitals are not well-equipped, it is natural that mortality and morbidity due to multiple burn, blasts, radiation injuries and psycho-social impact could be on very high scale and medical tackling of such a large emergency could have enough repercussions in the nearby areas of radioactive fallout."
She also mentioned that in the entire bill, there is not a single clause which speaks about taking healthcare during radiological emergencies. It reflects only about payment of compensation due to health impacts of such radiation. She suggested while setting up nuclear plants, consideration may also be given to the fact that there should be a hospital having trained doctors near such establishments and arrangements should also be made for free treatment of people who are affected by serious nuclear fallout.
She confessed that "her ministry is nowhere to meet an eventuality that may arise out of nuclear and radiological emergencies." Similar testimonies from secretaries of other ministries provide a chilling and prophetic forewarning.
In compliance of the suggestion of chairperson of the parliamentary committee during my testimony on August 3 and pursuant to a written submission dated July 7, TWA had specifically drawn the attention of the committee with regard to the narrow definition of the word 'installation' and conflict of interest ridden existence of the AERB. In a letter to the committee dated August 12, TWA has questioned the merit of centralised power stations given 35-40 percent transmission and distribution loss from power grids.
The secretary, financial services, ministry of finance, submitted before the committee that "any increase in premium of insurance will lead to increase in the cost of production of electricity for nuclear power. It is argued that higher the liability limit higher will be the insurance premium and subsequently higher will be the cost of electricity production."
Keeping these concerns in mind, opposition against the nuclear plants are emerging in a huge way.
Will the sane voice of Madban village be able to compel the might of a determined state to bulldoze its nuclear project at any cost, to rethink? The issue what is supreme AREVA's interest or the interest of villagers. Once again the insincerity and dishonesty of paying lip-service to Mahatma Gandhi's [ Images ] village republic and autocratically refusing to accord a sovereign status to the village at the same time stands exposed.

Uranium Corporation of India Limited in Jharkhand

UCIL’s underground mines in Jadugoda, Bhatin, Turamdhih, Narwapahar, and its open cast mine at Banduhurang extract 1,000 tons per day (TPD) of uranium ore. Two underground mines in the pipeline at Baghjata and Mahuldih will boost that amount. The ore is processed at the Jadugoda and Turamdih mills with a combined capacity of 5,000 TDP. The company earned $64 million in 2007-08, and made a $3 million profit.

The 20-year lease for UCIL's mines was up in 2007, and a new application is being processed. Under it, the company wants to add 6.37 hectares to tailing dam capacity and expand production, according to UCIL Chairman and Managing Director Ramendra Gupta. This move requires an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and Environmental Management Plan (EMP) drawn up by the Central Institute of Mining & Fuel Research (CIMFR), along with a public hearing.

Addressing the affected community at the May public hearing in Jadugoda, the company represented the local plans as “a marginal expansion.” But the UCIL website promises “a quantum leap in UCIL’s activities” that includes plans to "deepen the existing mines, expand its processing facilities,” and “not only opening new mines, but also the development of the community around its operations.”

While the company has created local schools and provides jobs and social services, villagers who attended the hearing argued that these provisions do not compensate for the health effects and destruction of their way of life.

“Why are we being made to pay such a heavy price, for so many decades”? Asks Hira Hansda, speaking of her three miscarriages and birth to five infants that quickly died. Her husband Sonaram worked at the tailing dam as a casual employee between 1984-87, and like many villagers, he links the deterioration in local health conditions to the arrival of the uranium mines. The last three surveys conducted in the area found increased radiation levels.

Heavy Security at UCIL’s Public Hearing Keeps Villagers Out

The public hearing on UCIL's new application took place at the heavily fortified camp of the Central India Security Force (CISF) within the UCIL colony at Jadugoda. Conducted by the Jharkhand State Pollution Control Board, the proceedings were marked by restrictions on personal liberties under sections of a law applying to situations with the potential to cause civil unrest.

Leaving little room for the public or protesters, the hall was packed with hundreds of UCIL workers and other company beneficiaries who held placards reading: “When compared to hunger, pollution is a small issue," and "Save UCIL.”

Those who had lost their lands and health to the mines were physically barred from the tent. Outside the proceedings, protesters shouted: “Do not destroy our land," “No uranium, no uranium waste, no weapons, care for the future." Many indigenous villagers waved the banner of the Jharkhandi Organization Against Radiation (JOAR), winner of the Germany-based Nuclear Free Future Award for its long crusade against the hazards of uranium mining in Jadugoda. The protesters denounced the hearing as "a farce" and demanded that it be immediately stopped.

Villager and JOAR president, Ghanashyam Biruli, issued the demands: no new uranium mines, bring the existing mine under international safety guidelines, return unused tribal land, provide livelihood and rehabilitation to displaced people, clean up the contamination, commission an independent study of environmental contamination and health effects, and monitor water bodies to ensure that the radionuclides do not seep into the aquifer that is the lifeline of more than 100,000 people. The activists also argued that since the country can buy uranium on the international market, there is no compelling need to expand UCIL's capacity.

The real compelling need, they asserted, was protecting health and the environment. The 2008 health survey by the Indian chapter of International Physicians for Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) provided clear evidence, finding that:

* Couples living near the mines were "1.58 times more vulnerable to primary sterility" with 9.6 percent of couples in study villages unable to conceive after three years of marriage, compared with 6.27 percent in a reference (control) group.

* Birth defects followed a similar pattern with 1.84 times higher incidence: “[B]abies from mothers, who lived near uranium mining operation area, suffered a significant increase in congenital deformities,” according to the report. While 4.49 percent of mothers living in the study villages reported bearing children with congenital deformities, only 2.49 percent of mothers in reference villages fell under this category." The national rate for people with disabilities (including congenital deformities) is 3 percent, according to official government statistics.

* Deformed babies near the mining operations are almost 6 times more likely to die, with 9.25 percent mothers in the study villages reporting congenital deformities as the cause of death of their children. In the reference village, mothers reported 1.70 percent of babies died of deformities.

* Cancer deaths were also higher: 2.87 percent of households in study villages attributed the cause of death to be cancer, compared to 1.89 percent in the reference village.

These factors contributed to a lowered life expectancy. In the study villages 68.33 percent of the population died before reaching the state's average life expectancy: 62 years old.

UCIL Denies Contamination

Despite such alarming reports, radiation data are not made public because they fall under the purview of the Atomic Energy Act of 1962. UCIL / DAE (Department of Atomic Energy) also cites security concerns for refusing to release data on health of the workers. But Buddha Weeps in Jadugoda, a 1999 award-winning film by Shri Prakash documented that, despite a law mandating regular monitoring, in the last five- to ten-year period few workers underwent blood and urine tests to assess the impact of radiation.

Independent scientists have confirmed the danger. Professor Hiroaki Koide, from the Research Reactor Institute, Kyoto University, Japan, sampled soil and air in the surrounding villages and documented that “The circumference of tailing ponds is impacted with uranium radiation. The strength of the radiation is of 10 to 100 times high in comparison to places without contamination. ...There are places where uranium concentration is high in the road or the riverside, and it is thought that tailings are used for construction material,” including on villagers' houses." Tailings are production waste material that, according to critics are unsafely stored, dumped, and used for landfills, roads and construction.

UCIL Technical Director D Acharya denied that the company was responsible for radiological contamination. “UCIL’s safety and pollution control measures are at par with the international standards, comparable at any point of time,” he said. The company is dealing with naturally occurring materials, he noted, the very low grade ore extracted is a minimal environmental hazard, and the company is not enriching the ore in Jadugoda.

But tacitly acknowledging the risks, UCIL head, Gupta, noted in the 2008 Annual Report that "External gamma radiation, Radon concentration, suspended particulate matters, airborne long lived Alpha activity and concentration of radio nuclides- uranium and Radium in surface and ground water, in soil and food items etc are monitored regularly."

Although he presented no evidence, UCIL Technical Director Acharya said that allegations of health problems are canards spread by anti-uranium lobbies, and that the physical fitness of the employees can be gauged the UCIL football team's success in winning the DAE tournaments for the past five years.

“From time to time we have also conducted structured health surveys and examinations, by independent sources," said Acharya. "One was done by the erstwhile Bihar Assembly, about ten years ago, but the findings are absolutely normal.” (The area was part of Bihar at the time.) "The effects of radiation are being constantly monitored by independent watchdogs, and there are health physics experts who are always with us, for round-the clock-vigil of the situation. Hence, there is really no cause of concern,” he added.

That is not the experience of many villagers, who link serious health problems to the mines. Like many of the women in the surrounding areas, Hansda's pregnancies were a time of terror. “It fills within us fear and apprehensions of the possible ordeal that may be in store. Who knows what would be the fate of the baby,” she said.

INDIA SOLD OUT   TO NUCLEAR POWER GENERATING MNCs DIRT CHEAP

Before enacting the law on “Nuclear Accident Liability Bill” , Government of India should consider the following issues
1.       The term Nuclear Accident must include the damages caused due to radiation leak affecting the employees in the nuclear facility , the people living near the facility & people affected by the effluents , scraps generated by the nuclear facility.
2.       The government of India does not have any right to fix a price tag for the lives of Indians , that too cheaper than US public.
3.       The Nuclear power generating companies must incorporate safety infrastructure & procedures as they do in US market , not any obsolete technology.
4.       In USA & other developing countries , they have very huge , efficient social security network , vast pool of resources put in by nuclear power generating companies themselves , to take care of the affected in case of a nuclear accident . In India we don’t have that type of social security network nor matching resources , therefore ideally India must fix a nuclear liability cap much higher than US market in dollar terms.
5.       Also the company must be made liable for the complete clean up of the facility & surrounding towns , villages , health care to all the affected victims on par with US market , in case a nuclear accident happens.
6.       The Nuclear Equipment Suppliers , Nuclear Plant Operators together with their respective governments like USA , UK must stand as guarantors .
7.       The Life Insurance Companies in India Must pay insured amount to nominees of insured in case of nuclear accidents / radiation affects in addition to compensation by the nuclear power companies . as of now many life insurance companies are not covering nuclear accidents / radiation affects.

Neither our MPs , Cabinet ministers nor IAS babus have the right to decide the fate of common people & fix a rate for lives of Indians. They are not experts in this field , they should not conclude any deals , decisions in a hush hush manner . Many scams have come out of hush hush deals . Nobody , no MP , no minister , no IAS officer has paid from his personal pocket to the victims of industrial disasters , etc. After all MPs , Ministers , IAS babus are public servants , they must just represent the voices of people , we people don’t want their personal expertise & opinions. Our Policy makers must heed to the public advice of senior scientists , experts in the field of nuclear power generation .

Ofcourse , as a result unit price of electricity will get front loaded , we may not get cheap electricity . but the lives of Indians are much valuable than Electricty. The person who benefits from cheap electricity – Industrialists does not pay from his pocket to the victims of disasters . Development not at the cost of safety & lives of common people. This must dawn on our ill informed policy makers at the earliest .

Letter To NHRC On Nuclear Liability For IAEA's Treaty
By Gopal Krishna

To,
Justice Shri K.G. Balakrishnan
The Chairperson
National Human Rights Commission (NHRC)
Faridkot House, Copernicus Marg, New Delhi

Sub: Human rights violations from nuclear damage - its impact on human life and enviro-occupational health

Sir,
This Hon’ble Commission has been seriously pursuing the problem of “enviro-occupational health”, and has been taking “preventive” as well as “remedial” measures. It is humbly brought to your notice that there is another equally serious enviro-occupational hazard which is exposure from radioactive radiations and wastes. The issue of liability for nuclear damage is directly linked to it. The grave problem of diseases caused to present and future generations by radiation exposures is required to be addressed as it affects environment and human health and violates Article 21 of the Constitution, Directive Principles as well as “human rights” as defined under the UDHR, ICCPR and ICESCR.
2. That at the outset, the Applicant wishes to refer to the problem of exposure from radioactive radiations. The Supreme Court has looked at the entire issue, keeping in view the Directive Principles as well as Article 21 of the Constitution, and held that “life” includes right to health and medical care etc. There is no database on the records of the Government to show, to the best of Applicant’s knowledge, as to what actions the Government has taken, namely, how many persons have been reported to be suffering from exposure to radioactive radiation? How many have died? Did they receive any compensation? How many persons suffering from it are receiving treatment?
3. That the Applicant is an environmental health researcher who was invited to make submissions before the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Science & Technology, Environment & Forests following a written submission on Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill, 2010 which is meant to pave the way for India to sign International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)’s Convention on Supplementary Compensation (CSC) for Nuclear Damage, 1997.
4. That in its 25 page report on Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill, 2010, Parliamentary Standing Committee on Science & Technology, Environment & Forests which was tabled in the Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha on 18th August, 2010.observes, “When the Committee inquired from the Secretaries of Ministries/Departments of Government of India who appeared before the Committee as to whether the draft nuclear liability Bill was referred to them for their views/comments, some of them viz. Ministries of Health & Family Welfare, Agriculture, Labour & Employment, Food & Public Distribution, etc. replied in the negative. The Committee is of the opinion that Government must have sought the opinion of Ministries which are even distantly related to any provision of the legislation. The Committee, therefore, recommends that in future Government should consult all such Ministries/ Departments which are even remotely concerned with the provisions of a proposed legislation.” This Hon’ble Commission may take cognizance of the submissions of these Secretaries and direct the concerned authorities to internalize their suggestions in the text of the Bill to protect the human rights of Indian citizens and safeguard intergenerational equity.
5. That, in view of the facts mentioned above, the applicant humbly submits that the Hon’ble Commission may kindly initiate appropriate proceedings and issue directions to all the concerned Secretaries of the Central Government and relevant States/UTs with regard to the following :
How would they respond in the event of a nuclear disaster?
Do they know as to how many industries/factories exist in the States/UTs where radioactive material is used? Is there an inventory of products wherein the said material is used?
What is the total number of workers employed in the nuclear power industries and other nuclear installations?
Whether there is regular medical check-up and whether medical facilities exist for workers and communities in the vicinity of nuclear installations?
Whether there is any record of persons who died because of radioactive radiation?
How many persons suffer from radioactive radiation and whether they are receiving regular treatment for the said disease?
What steps States/UTs have taken to check/prevent occurrence of radioactive radiations and how many hospitals dealing with the enviro-occupational diseases exist in the States/UTs.
How many institutions in the country have the competence to decontaminate and how many medical, occupational health and scientific institutions can diagnose radiation exposure?
What action has been taken by the central government and the State Governments/UTs have taken to protect exposure from radiation in the future?
6. That it is submitted that this Hon’ble Commission for the purpose of collecting the above information, may also take the benefit of its experience in the case of enviro- occupational diseases which are preventable but incurable. By giving medicines, impact of radioactive radiation can be reduced and life span can be prolonged but ultimately fate of the affected person is painful death. A brief note on the issue of liability from nuclear damage and the submissions of the concerned Secretaries of the central government is enclosed as Annexure A
7. That the applicant wishes to bring to this Hon’ble Commission’s notice that India has ratified Radiation Protection Convention, 1960 of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) but its provisions have not been complied with. India is yet to ratify ILO’s Occupational Cancer Convention, 1974 which is concerning Prevention and Control of Occupational Hazards caused by Carcinogenic Substances and Agents took cognizance of the Radiation Protection Convention and Radiation Protection Recommendation. It refers to the work done by International Agency for Research on Cancer and The International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) that provides guidance on all aspects of protection against ionising radiation. Article 6 of the ILO's Radiation Protection Convention with regard to “Maximum permissible doses of ionising radiations which may be received from sources external to or internal to the body and maximum permissible amounts of radioactive substances which can be taken into the body” has been ignored. Article 7 of the Convention calls for “Appropriate levels” be fixed in accordance with Article 6 for workers who are directly engaged in radiation work and are (a) aged 18 and over; (b) under the age of 18, No worker under the age of 16 to be engaged in work involving ionising radiations and Article 8 that seeks “Appropriate levels (to be) fixed in accordance with Article 6 for workers who are not directly engaged in radiation work, but who remain or pass where they may be exposed to ionising radiations or radioactive substances.” Drafters of the Nuclear Liability Bill appear to have ignored their recommendations.
8. It is humbly prayed that this Hon’ble Commission may enquire /investigate into the problem of radioactive radiation and issue necessary directions/recommendation for its prevention and appropriate remedial steps to the Central Government/State Governments and UTs.

Yours Faithfully
Gopal Krishna

NUCLEAR DISASTER IN MYSORE ?

Even in developed countries like USA & UK mal - handling of radio
active
materials takes place now & then, which in itself constitute nuclear
disasters
on small scale. Refer the Deccan Herald ( 12/10/03 to 18/10/03) for
details. few
years back, there were media reports about certain containers with
radio active
materials dumped in the open in Mysore city Railway Station. In Kaiga
nuclear
power project a doom collapsed. In India how many cases of
mal-handling of radio
active materials have taken place ? No public knowledge . In the back
drop of
corrupt ,negligent hush-hush, buck passing work culture in most of the
government service, I do want to know from the union Health Minister &
the
Karnataka State Health Minister, how safe are we from the processing &
storage
of radio active materials at M/s REMP, Mysore M/s REMP Kerala, & M/s
UCIL
Jadaguda Jharkhand ? How the spent fuel is disposed off in nuclear
power plants
in India ? few months back there were media reports about ill effects
of
radiation on the employees & peoples of adjacent villages near the
operations
site of M/s Uranium Corporation of India Ltd. Jadaguda Jharkhand &
Near the
Operations site of M/s REMP in Kerala.
In tsunami waves onslaught of december 2004 , the vital facilities of
kundakulam
nuclear reserch station in tamilnadu were damaged . just last week
tremors of
earth quake were felt in kaiga nuclear power plant in kaiga ,
karnataka . if
anything untoward happens as a result of natural calamities or human
failure ,
etc , what sort of contigency plans the government has got ready for
the safety
of public ?
Even some of the insurance companies like M/s Met Life India Insurance
Co. don't
cover the risk of physical / mental disabilities or death caused due
to nuclear
hazards . In such an event who will bear the cost of compensation ?
How the
quantum of compensation is calculated ? will you take into
consideration the
insurance policies brought by individuals ? Give me information about
the safety
measures taken by M/s REMP, M/s UCIL & other related agencies at all
it's
operation sites / nuclear sites.