IAMC Weekly News Roundup - September 19th, 2016 - IAMC
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News Digest

IAMC Weekly News Roundup – September 19th, 2016

In this issue of IAMC News Roundup

News Headlines

Opinions & Editorials

Book Review

Gujarat: Man thrashed by suspected cow vigilantes, dies in Ahmedabad (Sep 17, 2016, Indian Express)

A 25-year-old man, who was allegedly thrashed by cow vigilantes on September 13, died at a hospital in Ahmedabad on Friday, police said. Mohammad Ayyub Mev was admitted to V S Hospital after he was beaten up by unidentified persons on S G Highway on the night of September 13 after his car met with an accident. A calf which he was allegedly carrying in the car died in the mishap. Ayyub’s brother Imran alleged that he was beaten up on the suspicion that he was transporting cows for slaughter.…

“Ayyub’s car met with an accident on SG Highway on the night of September 13. When some bystanders checked the car, they found a calf and a bullock. Due to the impact, the calf died while the bullock was rescued. To save himself from people’s wrath, Ayyub started running,” said inspector P B Rana of Anandnagar police station here.…

However, Ayyub’s brother Imran alleged that assailants were cow vigilantes. “Those who killed my brother were indeed gau rakshaks. My brother was not carrying any cow. Out of some grudge, these gau rakshaks mercilessly thrashed him. We want the police to nab the real culprits,” said Imran.…

http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-news-india/muslim-man-mohammad-ayyub-mev-thrashed-by-suspected-cow-vigilantes-dies-gujarat-3035150/

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Muslim women ganged raped by Hindu gang ‘for eating beef’ (Sep 12, 2016, The Independent)

A Muslim woman who was gang raped in India has said her attackers asked her whether she ate beef in what some suspect was another crime by Hindu vigilante groups. The 20-year-old and her 14-year-old cousin were attacked by a group of men who trespassed into their home in Mewat, Haryana, and murdered their uncle and aunt before sexually assaulting the female victims two weeks ago.

Local police originally arrested four men for trespass and sexual assault, but after protests from the local community the men were charged with murder. Now the older victim has said the men asked the victims whether they ate beef before insisting they did and proceeding to attack them.

She told NDTV: “They asked if we eat beef. We said we don’t, but they insisted we did. “Then they said we’re hurting you before so you don’t and that if we tell anyone we’ll will be insulted.” Senior police officers have so far reportedly said the men had no link to so-called “cow vigilante groups”. But the Muslim community has expressed fears about a rise in attacks by Hindu groups.…

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/muslim-women-india-cow-vigilante-gang-raped-beef-sacred-a7238071.html

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RSS coup? Una victims may join Sangh Dalit rally (Sep 21, 2016, Times of India)

An RSS-affiliated Dalit group has claimed that the four Scheduled Caste youth who were brutally assaulted by cow vigilantes in Una, Gujarat, will join a march organised as part of the Sangh Parivar’s ambitious outreach to Dalits.…

The yatra is part of the Sangh Parivar’s effort to bring Dalits to the Hindutva mainstream. It is expected to help with the project of consolidation of Hindus into a political group and, simultaneously, prevent conversions to Christianity.…

Jignesh Mewani, a Dalit leader, saw the participation of the Una youth as an attempt to disintegrate the Dalit movement. “If it is so… I will definitely try to convince them not to go,” he added.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/54435421.cms

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Bijnor violence: ‘Before firing, made 12 calls to cops, MLA but no action taken’ (Sep 18, 2016, Indian Express)

Half-an-hour before the firing began in Pedda village of Bijnor on Friday morning, Anees Ahmed, 38, made 12 calls to the police control room, local MLA and senior district administration officials including the district magistrate. But nobody responded. Ahmed, husband of the pradhan of Gokalpur village – near Pedda village – said he was present at the spot when around 100 Jats gathered with weapons.

Some of them later fired at a Muslim family, leaving three of the family dead and 12 others injured. According to the police, trouble started after some Muslim girls were allegedly harassed at a bus stand on Friday morning. The dead have been identified as Haseenuddin, 50, Sarfaraz, 17 and Ehsan, 36.

Ahmed’s phone showed three calls to 100, the police control room, at 8:03 am. He said these calls went unanswered. At 8:07 am, he made two more calls to the same number. “The first three calls went unanswered. On the fourth call, the operator said he could not hear me. On the next call, he said they would see what they could do,” said Ahmed.…

http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-news-india/bijnor-violence-before-firing-made-12-calls-to-cops-mla-but-no-action-taken-3036819/

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Three killed in communal clash in Uttar Pradesh (Sep 17, 2016, The Hindu)

Three persons were killed and at least 12 others injured on Friday in a clash between two communities here after a school girl was allegedly harassed by some persons, the police said.

The incident in Peda village took place at around 8.15 a.m., with the groups of the two communities indulged in stone-pelting, they said, adding there was even firing between the clashing groups. Three persons, aged between 27 and 30, were killed in the clash. Five seriously injured were taken to Meerut for treatment.

According to the police, the girl was on her way to school when she was allegedly harassed by some youth belonging to another community. A passerby objected to this act but he was beaten up by the accused, the police said. Soon a clash broke out, There were reports of arson also. Heavy police picketing has been posted in the area.

http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/three-killed-in-communal-clash-in-uttar-pradesh/article9115935.ece

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Naroda Gam riots: SC orders Gujarat court to complete trial within six months (Sep 19, 2016, New Indian Express)

The Supreme Court on Monday ordered a Gujarat lower court to complete the trial of the 2002 Naroda Gam massacre case within six months. A special designated court in Ahmedabad is hearing the case.

The court had in June 2105 reserved its order on an application moved by the accused seeking arraignment of former IPS officer Rahul Sharma and former investigating officer of this case P.L Mal for destroying evidence.

The Naroda Patiya massacre took place on February 28, 2002, in Ahmedabad during the 2002 Gujarat riots in which 11 persons were killed. The massacre at Naroda occurred during the shutdown called by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad a day after the Godhra train burning.

http://www.newindianexpress.com/nation/Naroda-Gam-riots-SC-orders-Gujarat-court-to-complete-trial-within-six-months/2016/09/19/article3624811.ece

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Mumbai: 11 booked for ‘denying’ Muslim a flat in Vasai housing society (Sep 18, 2016, Indian Express)

Palghar police on Saturday evening booked 11 persons for allegedly intending to outrage and hurt the religious feelings of a 35-year-old Muslim man by denying him his right to buy a flat in the Vasai housing society.

According to police, the complaint was filed by Vikarahemad Khan after he approached the Manikpur police station claiming that the housing society had passed a “resolution” to deny him to make the purchase. Manikpur police station has booked the accused under sections 295 (A) (injuring with intent to insult the religion) and 298 (uttering, words, etc, with deliberate intent to wound the religious feeling of any person) of the Indian Penal Code.

Eleven committee members of one Happy Jivan, a housing society in Vasai, held a meeting to raise objections to the sale. Police said that flatowner Kantaben Patel (55) and her son Jignesh Patel (32) were handed over a “resolution” passed by the committee after they agreed to sell their 1BHK apartment to Vikarahemad Khan at Rs 47 lakh. Palghar police booked all those persons who signed on the “resolution”.…

http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-news-india/palghar-police-book-11-persons-for-denying-muslim-man-right-to-buy-flat-in-vasai-housing-society-3036560/

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Viqaruddin’s associates acquitted of killing home guard (Sep 15, 2016, Times of India)

In a major embarrassment to Counter Intelligence Cell (CIC) of Telangana police, three associates of Tehreek Ghalba e Islam (TGI) founder Viqaruddin Ahmed, who was killed in an encounter at Alair last year, were acquitted on Wednesday by II additional metropolitan sessions judge in a case of killing a home guard in 2009, on the second anniversary of Mecca Masjid bomb blast.

The trio – Riyaz Khan, Mohammed Abdul Sayeed and Vinod Kumar Sahu – were first arrested by anti terror outfit Octopus, formerly a police station established to deal with terror cases, for allegedly killing home guard K Balaswamy and injuring another constable identified as Rajendra Prasad by opening fire while they were performing duty at Nagulchinta Crossroads roads in Falaknuma in 2009.

“But the judge after going into the details of the evidence produced by CIC found that there is insufficient evidence to prove the connection between the three accused to the conspiracy, as alleged by the prosecution. The court in its judgement also observed that the prosecution could not prove the recoveries made by them to the given case,” Mohammed Muzafarullah Khan, the counsel for the three acquitted persons, told TOI.…

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/54338820.cms

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Khurram Parvez preventive detention: Did you follow law, Sessions Judge asks Magistrate (Sep 20, 2016, Indian Express)

The Executive Magistrate who passed the detention orders of prominent human rights defender Khurram Parvez did not see him personally or issue a show cause for bail bond, as required by the law, when he sent him to judicial custody.

When asked by the Principal District and Sessions Judge Srinagar Rashid Ali Dar to respond to the submission of counsels of Khurram that he was not produced before a magistrate, the Executive Magistrate Mohammad Amin Najar said: “I was told that he is handicapped and he is in jeep”.

Najar’s submission to court is in complete contradiction of the detention order he passed on September 16. The order issued by Executive Magistrate Najar to send Khurram to a jail in Kupwara, however, claimed that he “couldn’t produce a guarantor or the personal bond” and therefore was sent to a jail in Kupwara.…

http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-news-india/khurram-parvez-preventive-detention-when-did-you-get-the-judicial-powers-sessions-judge-asks-magistrate/

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Chhattisgarh slaps murder charges against policemen after dalit’s death in custody (Sep 19, 2016, Times of India)

Two days after a Dalit youth was “beaten to death” in Chhattisgarh, a murder case has been filed against three policemen and a home guard even as the government sanctioned solatium and promised job to the wife of the deceased.

Amid protests mounting against the custodial death, state’s principal secretary (Home) B V R Subramanian and director general of police A N Upadhyaya told reporters that on Monday evening that a case on the charges of murder and under the provisions of the SC/ST Atrocities (Prevention) Act has been registered against the policemen of Mulmula police station in Janjgir Champa district. Besides, a magisterial inquiry has been ordered into the circumstances leading to the death, they said.

Police had picked up a Dalit Youth Sunil Kumar Narange on Saturday last following a complaint from an engineer of Chhattisgarh state power Distribution Company limited after he had an argument with him over blackout in his village due to a defunct transformer. The villagers were making frequent visit to the electricity office as there was a blackout in the area for the last four days. Though the electricity officials had promised that the transformer would be repaired within a day or two, Narange went to the office and had an argument with the electricity officials.…

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/54409979.cms

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Opinions and Editorials

Corrosive impunities – By Satish Deshpande (Sep 13, 2016, Indian Express)

Impunity is the common thread that runs through Una and Dadri, connecting Dalits and Muslims in India today. Dictionaries define it as exemption from punishment, or more broadly, as the sense of security born of the assurance of protection from the consequences of one’s actions.

Crimes are committed even in healthy societies, but the society in which criminals flaunt their sense of impunity is seriously ill. It is precisely this sick self-assurance that has been on display in far too many places in the last two years, from Muzaffarnagar to Atali and Badaun to Dangawas.

But is the impunity with respect to Dalits essentially the same as that with respect to Muslims? If it is not, then how are they related? Most important, what do these pathologies presage for our collective future as a nation?…

http://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/una-flogging-dadri-lynching-rohith-vemula-dalit-atrocities-hindutva-bjp-rss-3027981/

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Flaw And Order – By Prakash Singh (Sep 26, 2016, Outlook)

As far back as 2003, Justice V.S. Malimath, formerly chief justice of the Karnataka and Kerala high courts, said that the criminal justice system was virtually collapsing and that people were losing confidence in it. The warning went unheeded. No wonder, the ghosts are now coming to haunt us.

The entire administrative structure, including the police, came crashing down in Haryana during the reservation agitation in February. The state had, for all practical purposes, withered away for two days. The deployment of the army in the state somehow propped up the government. There is no realisation yet at the highest levels that a similar collapse could happen elsewhere also.

The straws in the wind are in fact already there in UP. The 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots could have been contained in the very initial stages if Lucknow had allowed the district administration to deal with the situation firmly and not interfered. Mathura was a complete mess where land grabbers were allowed to run a parallel establishment with the connivance, if not blessings, of those in power. The Bulandshahr rapes demonstrated the brazenness of the criminals and how unsafe the highways of the state are. All is not well with our administrative structure. Its police wing particularly seems to be crumbling.…

http://www.outlookindia.com/magazine/story/flaw-and-order/297860

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The Lingering Pain Of Muzaffarnagar – By Rama Dwivedi (Sep 9, 2016, Outlook)

“Kabristan bbhejenge ya Pakistan bhejenge (We will send you either to Pakistan or to the burial ground),” these words echo still in the mind of Rizwan— a resident of Shamli district in Uttar Pradesh and a victim of the communal violence that rocked the state in 2013, considered to be the ‘worst’ in the state’s recent history – as he tries to recall the chronicles of that unfortunate day.…

That night, in his village Lisadh, approximately 150 houses were burnt down which immediately led to massive displacement of Muslim families. With memories of the violence fresh in their minds, these families are still living in ‘temporary’ camps, even after three years of the violence.

“It’s the government apathy and the narrative of impunity which needs to be told again and again,” says social worker-writer Harsh Mander who has worked extensively in these colonies, while launching his book Living Apart: Communal violence and forced displacement in Muzaffarnagar and Shamli. The book comes as a status report of these colonies after an in-depth survey by his team that includes- Akram Akhtar Chaudhary, Zafar Eqbal and Rajanya Bose.…

http://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/the-lingering-pain-of-muzaffarnagar/297191

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Eight years after Kandhamal violence, justice still evades many – By Harsh Mander (Sep 14, 2016, Hindustan Times)

It is eight years since communal violence swept the second poorest, deeply-forested district of Odisha, Kandhamal. We must not allow the erasure of this hate violence from public memory, because the suffering and displacement of the tribal and Dalit Christians targeted by the communal violence are unabated even today, and justice is systematically denied.

The violence in 2008 was produced by a long hate campaign by Hindutva activists dating back to the 1960s, with periodic attacks on Christian places of worship, priests and nuns. The number of persons killed in 2008 was less than 100, but the looting and arson of properties and shrines was extensive, as was sexual violence. Six hundred villages of Christian converts were attacked and 5,600 houses ransacked and set aflame. Approximately 54,000 people were rendered homeless, and 295 churches and chapels destroyed. Thirteen schools, colleges and institutions for the sick were burned.…

Because of the profound failures of justice, there is no possibility for the wounds of the hate violence to heal. As activist and senior journalist John Dayal observes sadly of the lives of the survivors of the carnage: “Fear is still a reality”.

http://www.hindustantimes.com/columns/eight-years-after-kandhamal-justice-still-evades-many/story-Al880zQZ6K9g0GyApXvcEM.html

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Illusion of legality – By Faizan Mustafa (Sep 19, 2016, Indian Express)

Advocates of the uniform civil code attach out of place importance to Muslim Personal Law (MPL) without really appreciating both its lack of “legality” as well as “divinity”. In fact, the Muslim Personal Law Board has, in its affidavit in the apex court, taken the position that MPL is not “law” as defined by the Indian Constitution.

The Narendra Modi government has referred the question of the uniform civil code to the Law Commission of India. Several benches of the Supreme Court are presently examining MPL’s legality and the government has to state its position. Last year, in the Kerala High Court, the BJP government gave an affidavit which stated, “it is the consistent policy of Central government not to interfere in the personal laws of minorities unless necessary initiative for such changes comes from a sizeable cross sections of such communities.”…

How can a court dictate that a citizen in his personal matters follow one school/opinion and not another? Any Muslim may leave a particular school and start following another school. Will courts now decide constitutionality of even juristic opinions? If we are convinced that mere normative changes in law do bring in social reforms, then the legislature is the better forum to initiate reforms. As far as “triple divorce” is concerned, it has already been held unconstitutional in number of cases, and therefore, there is no need for yet another Supreme Court verdict on this issue. Instant divorce without efforts of reconciliation is not valid today. Even the personal law board’s much talked about affidavit has conceded this point.

http://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/islam-quran-islamic-law-triple-divorce-supreme-court-muslim-personal-law-constitution-illusion-of-legality-3037921/

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Reckless Hindutvavadi ‘Patriots’ – Editorial (Sep 24, 2016, EPW)

We do not know the context in which Samuel Johnson made his oft-quoted pronouncement that “patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.” Certainly, he was not indicting patriotism in general, but false patriotism and the false patriot. But why rake up what that celebrated person of letters said way back in 1775? Well, the Hindutvavadi nationalists in power at the centre and in a number of states are behaving just like the kind of “patriots” Johnson probably had in mind.

In India today, self-designated desh bhakts are a dime a dozen—in the corridors of power; in the corporate media, especially among the talking heads and anchors on satellite television, as also among the op-ed and editorial writers in the print media; in the parties in power as well as those in the opposition; and among serving and retired senior officers of the military. There are so many of them that it is hard to keep count.…

The Hindutvavadi nationalists, wanting to derive the maximum advantage from this in cementing India’s “great power” status as South Asia’s hegemon, are gunning for militarily cutting Islamabad down to size. But much to their consternation, US Secretary of State, John Kerry is against such adventurism.

http://www.epw.in/journal/2016/39/editorials/reckless-hindutvavadi-patriots.html

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Book Review

Gujarat Files: Anatomy of a Cover Up

Author: Rana Ayub
Reviewed by: Ish N Mishra
Available at: Rana Ayub, New Delhi 112016. www.amazon.com/
Review:
Political Underworld And Adventure Journalism (Sep 20, 2016, Countercurrents)

The people of my generation, particularly those who were associated with students’ movement in 1970s, still have memories of fascist terrorism unleashed during the Emergency.… In every area Modi’s undeclared emergency is more frightening than the Emergency declared by Indira Gandhi.… After coming to power at the Centre attacks on democratic institutions and right of expression are an effort to expand fascist terrorism of Gujarat to the entire country.…

The book is an evidence of the reality accepted by insidious devotees that because of these genocides and fake encounters and resulting polarisation Narendra Modi and Amit Shah reached the throne of Delhi while crossing labyrinth of power. This book is also a strong slap on social awakening of the country which instead of being furious over such a holocaust and rape made the sponsors of the crimes adorable. This book reveals the truth which the power is trying to prove otherwise by all means. This revealing truth (I am not saying revelation because these are universally known truths) is from those officials who chose to keep mum before the probe commissions. …

As has been revealed in this book, Modi never ordered anything in writing. His oral orders were illegal. Gujarat Home Secretary at the time of 2002 riots Ashok Narayan who believes in “live and let live” says, “He never writes anything on paper. He has his own men. His messages used to reach lower level police officials through them and members of Vishwa Hindu Parishad (page 86)… Otherwise too he does not come in front. He is so clever and talks so cleverly on phone – he rings officials and says ‘OK take care of that area’. For ordinary person its meaning is ‘keep in mind that there is no riot in that area’, but the hidden meaning is that ‘take care that a riot has to be started there’… He does not do anything himself. For this there is a chain of the agents. Then case is registered against the crowd. Now how will you arrest crowd?” (page 88) When a high level official like Home Secretary is so helpless, one can only regret the murder of democracy.…

<ahref=”http: www.countercurrents.org=”” 2016=”” 09=”” 20=”” political-underworld-and-adventure-journalism”=””>http://www.countercurrents.org/2016/09/20/political-underworld-and-adventure-journalism

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