Women and children confront bulldozers at Delhi's 'Kathputli' colony

Reported by Sonal Mehrotra, Edited by Deepshikha Ghosh | Updated: February 27, 2014

Residents of Delhi's Kathputli colony protesting against move to shift them

Hundreds of women and children are standing against bulldozers at a colony in west Delhi where shanties will be torn down to make way for multi-storey housing. Some 3,000 families of the 'Kathputli (puppet)' colony, home to puppet makers, drummers, magicians and artisans from 13 states, are protesting against a move to shift them for the construction.

Colourful life-size puppets are also part of the protest.

"Nobody is helping us. Leaders ask us to entertain foreign guests, we represent the country. I have been given an award by (former president) APJ Abdul Kalam but I have no place to keep it. We are being driven out for the benefit of one person," said Puran Bhatt, a puppeteer.

They say their home of six decades has been sold to builders for a throwaway price of Rs. 6.11 crore, though the national auditor's report has valued the land at Rs. 1043.2 crore.

According to a deal between the civic body Delhi Development Authority and private developer Raheja in 2007, the residents will be shifted to transit camps until multi-storey flats are constructed for them. But they say they don't want the flats; just the land.

"The project was signed without consulting people living here. People who run small businesses here don't want to shift to these buildings, it will ruin their lives," said Sunaina, an activist who has joined the protests.

Last week, the families made an appeal to Delhi Lieutenant Governor Najeeb Jung.

"If we are shifted into flats then how will all the wood workers, singers who practice their skills, idol makers, puppeteers who make 15 feet tall puppets, those of us who walk on 15-foot tall stilts, rickshaw pullers, weavers, tailors, painters, construction workers, rope makers, toy makers, magicians, sanitation workers, drummers who play dhols that weigh 50-60 kgs and many others workers and artisans who live here be able to sustain our work and livelihood?" they asked in a letter
.http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/women-and-children-confront-bulldozers-at-delhi-s-kathputli-colony-489079

Define, Refine, Redefine

AFP (FROM OUTLOOK 03 MARCH 2014) Tight spot Tejpal leaves Goa HC after a bail hearing LAW: RAPE Define, Refine, Redefine Are the new laws against sexual harassment and rape ‘draconian’? The Tejpal debate. ANURADHA RAMANEver since Tarun Tejpal, founder-editor of Tehelka, was arrested in November 2013 for the ‘rape’ of a junior colleague in a Goa resort, there has been plenty of debate on whether what he is accused of doing constitutes rape. With the police formally charging him so under seven sections of the new law that came into force last April, the public is taking its first good look at these provisions. The question being asked in some circles: is a 10-year prison sentence for three minutes of non-penile misconduct in a moving lift taking things too far?     “Making law more detrimental is not the right approach, creating problems in the fundamental idea —presumption of innocence.”Dayan Krishnan, Senior Advocate     The reason Tejpal and others in similar situations are feeling the heat of the Criminal Law Amendment Act, 2013, is simple: it places the woman at the centre of the legislation. The law unambiguou­sly asserts a woman’s right to her body. Any invasion of that privacy, whether with the penis (as rape was defined traditionally) or with any other object, amounts to rape. A woman’s body is her private space. Anyone who transgresses this space has to suffer the consequ­ences. Says additional soli­ci­­tor-general Indira Jaising, “The new law takes care of the scale of violence committed on women. Earlier, a lot of people were acquitted as penetration could not be proved.” Blame it on ignorance or plain incomprehension, it is this overturning of the old order that has led to the tch-tching over Tejpal’s plight—that what he did was not rape in the classical sense of the term; that rape is necessarily penile, or at least truly physically violent. Like what happened to Nirbhaya, the intern who was raped and brutalised in a bus in Delhi in December 2012. Or to the women in Muzaffarnagar who went to a  pradhan’s house and were subjected to rape. Or what Soni Sori underwent at the hands of the Chhattisgarh police. Or what scores of women suffer in Kashmir, Manipur or other distur­bed areas, where special armed forces laws are in force.     “Tejpal happened to occupy a position of authority. Punishment is higher as the law is clear about defining coercive environment.”Indira Jaising, Addl Solicitor General     The National Crime Records Bureau recorded 25,000 cases of rape in 2012. The latest estimates suggest that a new case of rape is reported every 22 minutes. Conviction rates have historically been dismal. In 2011, when some 15,423 rape cases were tried, the overall rate of conviction stood at 26.4 per cent. The number of cases of rape have gone up in the intervening years. To Tejpal’s ill-luck, as he cries “political vendetta” at being kept in detention in a BJP-ruled state for 80 days counting, he has bec­ome the test case of the new law under the unrelenting glare of the media. (Godman Asaram Bapu’s case, though unfolding at the same time, relates to ‘traditional’ rape.)  The new law expands the old definition of rape to include a series of acts. It might be said that it serves as a measure of the scale of violence against women. For instance, Section 354 of the IPC now has an additional clause, 354(a), which states that if a man seeks physical contact and makes advances, involving unwelcome and explicit sexual overtures, makes a demand or request for sexual favours, shows pornography, or makes sexually coloured remarks, it is a straight case of sexual harassment and shall be punished with rigorous imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years, or be levied with a fine, or both. In the 2,846-page chargesheet, Tejpal has been slap­ped with 354(a) too, based on his admission in an e-mail sent to the young woman and the former managing editor of Tehelka, Shoma Chaudhury, in which he apologises for attempting a sexual liaison. This is apart from six other sections, including the one with the new definitions of rape under the various Section 376 clauses.     “The definition of rape has been expanded, as was necessary. But there has been no gradation or proportionality in sentencing.”Madhu Mehra, Women’s Rights Lawyer     The sexual harassment section, parti­cularly some of its clauses, pose a problem for some lawyers. Argues advocate Raja­she­khar Rao, “What do you make of a comment like this: ‘You’re look­ing very beautiful (or hot) today’? And if the comment is repeated freque­ntly?” It all boils down to how women perceive it. If the woman ticks the man off for being too familiar—yet he continues to make such comments—it beco­mes a fit case for harassment.” Rao cautions that the clause has scope for misuse, though he clarifies that it needs to be tested as it is strictly based on the exc­hange between the accused and the woman. It is the charge of rape brought against Tejpal that is seen as problematic by many who contest its clauses as too severe. Again, the law states that a man is said to commit rape if he penetrates a woman with his penis or any object or manipulates any part of the body of a woman so as to cause penetration. The punishment for this is imprisonment for no less than 10 years. The law also says the consent of the woman has to be unequivocal. It is in the context of consent that the law is unambiguous. Her consent has to be absolute: if she does not physically resist the act of violative penetration, it does not follow that consent has been given. It is also here that the law takes note of positions of power and authority. Tejpal has admitted to attempting a sexual liaison as an “awful misreading of the situation”.  The law leaves little scope for misreading a woman’s intention and also categorically puts the onus on the man to show that consent obtained was absolute and also does away with the “conduct” of the victim.     The law leaves little scope for misreading the intentions of a woman: the onus is on the man to show absolute consensus.     It is no longer about causing grievous injury to the woman, which is what the statute book said before amendments. “You have gone where you should not have gone. The fact is attempting an intercourse—and that is not permissible under the law,” says Rao. Adds Jaising, “In Tejpal’s case, he occupied a position of auth­ority. Punishments are higher in this, as the law is clear about defining coercive environment in the context of trust placed in men occupying a position of power.” This invited two clauses (f) and (k) of 376(2), which ups maximum punishment to 10 years. It’s in the quantum of punishment that senior advocate Dayan Krish­nan, counsel in the Delhi gangrape case, raises issues about. “To make a law more detrimental, to my mind, is not the right approach and creates problems in the context of the underpinn­ing of criminal law—presumption of innocence. It might lead to a situation where every judge will say he will err on the side of acquittal.” Krishnan is however clear that in a more expansive definition of sexual assault, it is right that the law is from a woman’s perspective. Clearly, the new law calls for a behavioural change from men and cautions them against transgressing it. http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?289597#.Uwifkc7npTA.facebook

Activists associated with women's movements from different parts of India today wrote an open letter to social activist Anna Hazare expressing their disappointment over the Gandhian campaigning for Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress Party.

Activists associated with women's movements from different parts of India today wrote an open letter to social activist Anna Hazare expressing their disappointment over the Gandhian campaigning for Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress Party in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.

"From small satyagrahas in Maharashtra to the huge mobilisations in Delhi, you have stressed on the need to cleanse Indian politics and expressed your anguish over the violence that women and young girls are subjected to.

"We are shocked that you have chosen to express support to and solidarity with the Chief Minister of West Bengal who, in three years, has transformed West Bengal from being the safest state for women to the most unsafe.

"It is not just the fact that the most barbaric forms of violence are being suffered by women and girls in the State but the fact that in many cases, leaders and activists of the ruling Party are involved and often the reaction of the Chief Minister has been insensitive, critical of the victim and not reflective of any intention of punishing the perpetrators," the letter claimed.

In the letter, the women organisations referred to the National Crimes Records Bureau's annual report 2012 according to which West Bengal, with 7.5 per cent share of country's female population, has accounted for nearly 12.7 per cent of total crime against women by reporting 30,942 cases during the year 2012.

"In cases of general crime and crimes against women, West Bengal registered an increase of 41.6 per cent in 2012 which is the highest in the country," the letter highlighted.

The letter mentions the gangrape incident of a taxi-driver in Madhyamgram in Howrah District in December.

"The complete negligence of the police and administration were responsible for this crime. In fact, the perpetrators were given protection by the police," the letter stated. 17

Mentioning gangrape of the tribal girl by 13 residents of her village on the orders passed by the village panchayat to punish her for having a relationship with a man from outside her community, the organisations alleged that, "The response of the police and administration were extremely unsatisfactory and it has now been established that members of the ruling party actually signed the documents of the so-called agreement drafted by the panchayat."

Further, they also mentioned the incident in which a 27 year-old woman and her mother-in-law (43) were gang-raped in Howrah District by 10 persons in February this year.

"The involvement of the TMC members in the incident has since been confirmed by the police and administration," the letter said.

"What is shocking, Annaji, is that the Chief Minister of West Bengal has one stock answer to all questions regarding the barbaric violence and threats that women and girls are facing in her state-- these are all politically-motivated.

"Also not a single police official has been held responsible or punished for any of these atrocities. We hope that you will re-consider your decision and give up your intention of campaigning for Mamta Banerjee and her Party," the letter said.

The letter has been signed by JanJagmati Sangwan of All Indian Democratic Women's Association(AIDWA), Kavita Krishnan of All India Progressive Women Association (AIPWA), Annie Raja of National Federation of Indian Women (NFIW), professor Jayati Ghosh of Jawaharlal Nehru University(JNU), Leila Passaah of Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA) AND professor Mritunjoy Mohanty of IIM Kolkatta among others.

http://www.financialexpress.com/news/activists-warn-anna-hazare-against-mamata-banerjee-invoke-gangrapes-violence/1227498/0

Atrocities in jails forced me to join politics: Soni Sori

New Delhi, Feb 18 (IANS) She never thought of joining politics. But 38-year-old Soni Sori, brutally tortured by police in Chhattisgarh for her alleged links with Maoists, has joined the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in her desperate bid to change the system.

Sori, keen to contest the Lok Sabha polls from Bastar, said she wants to fight for those jailed on false charges by the BJP government of Raman Singh in Chhattisgarh.

"I was never interested in politics. I wanted to live a normal life. But the torture and atrocities in the jails and police custody have changed my entire thought process and outlook," a frail-looking Sori told IANS.

"Now I want to contest elections and through AAP I will transform the system. I have seen so many innocents jailed on false charges. I want to work for them.

"I saw life from very close quarters when I was in jail. I had never heard, seen or read anything like what happened to me and other prisoners. It has changed me completely," she said.

Sori and her nephew Lingaram Kodopi, a budding journalist who had ambitions of empowering the poor tribals, were accused of receiving money from a corporate house, a charge they denied. The money was supposedly meant for the Maoists. Kodopi was arrested in September 2011 and Sori a month later.

She spent over two years in jails in Raipur and Jagdalpur in Chhattisgarh and then in Delhi's Tihar jail.

Dressed in a yellow colour salwar-suit and a jacket and accompanied by Kodopi, Sori recalled the horror which have left a lasting impression on her psyche.

"I was brutally tortured in Raipur jail. While in the custody of the Dantewada police, I was stripped naked and given electric shocks at the orders of (then) district police superintendent Ankit Garg. "I was sexually assaulted by three of his men," she added.

Sori, a mother of two daughters and a son, was subsequently warded in the Kolkata Medical College Hospital where doctors removed stones inserted into her vagina and rectum.

The former primary school teacher-turned-tribal rights activist has been staying in New Delhi for four months after the Supreme Court granted her and her nephew interim bail in November.

They were barred from entering Chhattisgarh but a recent court verdict has allowed them to visit their hometown.

Sori is determined to bring an end to injustice and atrocities committed against people like her, especially in Chhattisgarh, where the Maoists have held sway for years in places like Bastar.

"I met several people inside the jail who too had been imprisoned on false charges like me," she said.

According to Sori, she got a call from AAP leader Prashant Bhushan last week offering her a Lok Sabha ticket from Bastar. She accepted the offer.

"The people of Bastar don't enjoy the rights guaranteed by our country's constitution. I want to help and empower them," Sori said.

"I want to become the voice of the people of Bastar."

Sori is at present staying with her nephew and 10-year-old younger daughter Apsara in Delhi but plans to return to village Jabeli in Dantewada district to prepare for the polls expected in April-May.

"I would love to see her contesting the election. Being a student of journalism, I want to work in the field of writing," Kodopi told IANS.

Sori's elder daughter studies in Class 8 and lives with a relative while her son Jitendra studies in Class 6 and stays in a hostel.

Her husband died due to some undiagnosed neurological condition that paralysed him from waist down in Dantewada in August 2013.

AAP recently announced a list of 20 candidates for the Lok Sabha election. Sori's name was finalized for the Bastar seat, as per the party sources, but there is yet to be a formal announcement.

http://in.news.yahoo.com/atrocities-jails-forced-join-politics-soni-sori-132618581.html

Punish my father, he raped me: a Haryana schoolgirl's horror at home All India

Edited by Deepshikha Ghosh | Updated: February 20, 2014


Sonepat, Haryana:  In a matter of four months, a schoolgirl in Haryana was allegedly gang-raped twice and then sexually assaulted by her father.

In her statement to the police, the girl gave a horrifying account of repeated assault in her village in Sonepat, less than an hour from Delhi, and in her own home.

A group of boys from her village allegedly gang-raped her twice in two months.

They were all arrested, but then her father allegedly started raping her.
 
"My father raped me in September. He said if I tell anyone he will get me killed. I want to study but my father wants to push me into prostitution. Please save me," she said.

Her story emerged after a local NGO took her to the police and she told them that she did not want to go home.

Her father has been arrested and booked for rape.
 
"My father raped me. I don't want to live with him...he should be punished...I want justice," she said in a letter. She has now been placed in care of the NGO.

The girl's mother says she was not aware of what was happening in her own home. "She never told me. She only told me now," she said, asking for strongest possible punishment for her husband.

India enacted harsher laws for crimes against women last year, after the fatal gang-rape of a young student on a moving bus in December, 2012 jolted the nation and brought thousands of protesters out on the streets.
http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/punish-my-father-he-raped-me-a-haryana-schoolgirl-s-horror-at-home-485728?fb

‘It Is A Congress Conspiracy Against The Minorities’

NEHA DIXIT

March 20, 2010, Issue 11 Volume 7

Akhilesh Yadav, chief of the SP’s Uttar Pradesh unit, tells Neha Dixit how the UPA is misleading the nation on the Women’s Reservation Bill

Photo: Dharmender Ruhil

Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav and RJD chief Lalu Prasad have called the Women’s Reservation Bill a political conspiracy.
The Samajwadi Party is not against the Bill. Of course, the Bill in its present form is a conspiracy to keep out the minorities. The BJP and the Congress are scared of the mettle of backward class leaders like Lalu Yadav, Mulayam Singh and Ram Vilas Paswan. Hence, they are hesitating to include reservation of backward classes in the women’s Bill. SP also wants the upliftment of women. We are only asking for the inclusion of Dalits, Muslims and minorities.

But by opposing the Bill, you are dismissing reservation for women altogether.
Reservation for women has to be party-based. Women should get 50 percent reservation in government jobs. Parties should take the initiative to reserve tickets for women from all strata of society. All parties issue tickets to those with money and muscle power. We are demanding this should change.

We don’t want to see wives of bureaucrats occupying seats in Parliament. The whole purpose will be defeated then. Hence, women’s empowerment is only possible if 33 percent of tickets in each party are reserved for women.

All major parties including the BJP, Congress and the Left are criticising the SP’s stand.
The Left’s opposition is totally political. The BJP and Congress support the Bill but they need to answer a question: till date, why has Parliament not seen a single Muslim MP elected from Orissa, Punjab, Uttaranchal or Madhya Pradesh? With this sort of non-representation of minorities, who will guarantee representation of women from the backward classes? Clearly, it is not possible.

The BJP was supporting the Bill but is now demanding a debate. I know several Congress MPs who have, off the record, told me that they too disagree with the Bill. They too demand reservation for Muslims and Dalits.

‘Several Congress MPs have, off the record, told me that they too disagree with the Bill’

Who are these Congress MPs?I can’t name them as Congress is dictatorial. It has a system of firing dissenters.

But the first woman Lok Sabha Speaker, Meira Kumar, is also a Dalit.
Both Meira Kumar and President Pratibha Patil have been elected to their respective offices on merit. Meira Kumar has risen to that position through her efforts, not through reservation. Congress has a history of not giving tickets to women. They are merely misleading the nation.

Will SP’s withdrawal of support to UPA make any difference to the Bill?If nothing else, it will at least expose them. All those in the Congress who are pompously sleeping and eating at Dalit homes must understand that this will not make any difference to their lives. The Dalits and minorities must be given adequate representation for their progress. We were supporting the Congress because we wanted the BJP to stay out of power. We were supporting it for secular values. However, there is no option but to withdraw if it chooses to ignore those values.

http://www.tehelka.com/it-is-a-congress-conspiracy-against-the-minorities/

Eyes Wide Shut

Gender justice aside, why the Congress, the BJP and even the Left are united in blocking the sub-quota for backward caste women

AJIT SAHI  | @ajitsahi

March 20, 2010, Issue 11 Volume 7

For the human race to survive, Mahatma Gandhi would always insist, its women must eventually take charge of the affairs of men. In the last 150 years, incredibly courageous women’s rights movements have waged epochal battles across the world, most notably in the US, to wrest parity from generations of chauvinistic men, bringing themselves adult suffrage, working rights and numerous social, political and economic benefits. So, for India to become one of the world’s first big democracies to reserve for women one-third of all its 545 Lok Sabha seats and 4,000-odd legislative seats across 28 states is a powerful moment in history. Why then oppose the Women’s Reservation Bill? Are these misogynists foolishly ranged against the tide of history, or feudal lords threatened to extinction by an idea whose time has come?

First, it needs to be asked why the UPA — which has shown little urgency during its six years in power to bring substantive policies to improve the well-being of India’s more than half-a-billion women — should so aggressively push for this Bill to become law, without allowing any vigorous debates within and outside Parliament, going to the extent of issuing a whip to force its MPs to toe the line. It is stunning that the Bill — or the government — has not disclosed how the reservation for women would translate into tangible benefits for women, society and the nation. Finally, why is the government refusing to allow a sub-quota for the backward castes, as the opponents of the Bill have demanded?

The real story behind both the support for and the opposition to the Bill, lies in India’s complex castebased politics. Typically, the upper-caste dominated parties, such as the Congress, the BJP and even the Left, back the Bill. Whereas parties peopled by the middle and the lower castes, such as the RJD, the JD(U) and the Samajwadi Party, are opposed to it. As it were, the backward and the lowest Hindu castes, traditional supporters of the Congress, began deserting it in the 1980s. Their honeymoon with the BJP, too, began tapering off during the 1990s. The emergence of backward caste leaders such as Mulayam Singh Yadav, Lalu Prasad Yadav, Kanshi Ram and Mayawati over the last 30 years saw these lower segments of society become a formidable political force against the Congress and the BJP.

Since 1989, no party has won absolute majority in seven general elections. Instead, backward caste and Dalit leaders have forced coalition politics on the socalled national parties, the Congress and the BJP. There seems no formula in sight for the upper caste leadership of the Congress and the BJP to contain and possibly reverse the charge of the backward caste political parties. Because women’s struggles are yet to fully emerge among the backward castes as a social movement, it is plain obvious that in an open contest on seats reserved for general women, there won’t be enough backward caste women to take on the upper caste women. This is how the BJP and the Congress hope to increase their numbers in the Parliament at the next elections.

Of course, there’s the worrying issue of declining merit in Parliament, which has become a rubber stamp to approve any government policy, because the antidefection law forces MPs to toe the party line. In the absence of genuine grassroots women leaders, a large number of them elected in the reserved quota will have little connect with the masses and may well make Parliament even more a body of yes-men and yes-women, than a true representative of 1.1 billion people.

http://www.tehelka.com/eyes-wide-shut/