Fate of Yamuna floodplain still hangs in "balance" despite National Green Tribunal rap on Sri Sri event

By Ashok Shrimali*
While the National Green Tribunal (NGT) on Thursday reportedly pulled up the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) for granting permission to hold spiritual guru Sri Sri Ravi Shankar's World Culture Festival on the banks of Yamuna, the chief petitioners against the high-profile event Yamuna Jiye Abhiyan has declared, the “fate of the floodplain still hangs in balance.”
Next date of hearing for the high-profile event, which is to see the participation of the Prime Minister and the President, is either Monday (March 7) or Tuesday (March 8) in the event Monday is declared a holiday.
While the DDA told the NGT that it had reason to “stop” the function now, Abhiyan convener Manoj Misra said in a statement that “It was the DDA got totally expose itself on its science and ‘art’ of decision making with regard to the Yamuna flood plains.
“The DDA advocate was hard put to defend its approval dated December 15, 2015 given to Sri Sri’s Art of Living (AOL) event”, it said, adding, “The DDA admitted it had “withdrawn in mid-2015 an ‘approval’ to AOL which, it had earlier claimed had never been given.”
The second time it withdrew its permission was on November 30, 2015 in order to quickly provide a fresh and final permission on December 15, 2015”, Abhiyan said, adding”, DDA counsel had no convincing answer to the bench's query that what had changed from the earlier reasons of rejection.”
“While initially the DDA counsel stated that the DDA had no details of the planned event and the fact that it was going to be so huge in extent. Later it emerged during cross questioning by the bench that AOL had indeed given some area details which included 20 ha of sitting space, 1.5 ha of platform and 2.4 ha of parking space” the Abhiyan said.
“DDA counsel also could not explain as to why in its approval letter it talks only of maintaining a safe distance from the river edge without specifying what that safe distance would mean. Interestingly the same counsel went on to admit that the construction was happening right next to the river and even within the river”, Abhiyan said,
“While admitting that the AOL had exceeded the permission given to it and at one point the DDA stand seemed like the AOL and DDA were opposite parties in the case, soon it became clear that the DDA was only trying to save its own skin in the matter”, Abhiayan said, adding, “The million dollar question remains that since DDA admits that AOL has violated / exceeded its permission then what prevents it from withdrawing the approval under para 6 of its approval letter.”
“Following this, Abhiyan said, there is a question mark on DDA as competent and reliable agency to look after the river flood plain in the city”, Abhiyan said, wondering, “Why should not all such correspondences and the decision making processes always be made public soonest these are taken.”
“How can a private organisation come to gain such a clout that it can bend any agency and any law / rules to meet its ends?”, asks Abhiyan, wondering, “While DDA was at pains to try and defend its approval as not being in the teeth of the NGT orders, the fact remains that it very much is and we in our reply are going to clearly establish how DDA approval is illegal and ab initio void.”
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*Senior activist based in Ahmedabad, secretary-general, mines, minerals and People (mm&P)

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Girl child education: 20 major states 'score' better than Gujarat, says GoI report

By Rajiv Shah
A Government of India report, released last month, has suggested that “model” Gujarat has failed to make any progress vis-à-vis other states in ensuring that girls continue to remain enrolled after they leave primary schools. The report finds that, in the age group 14-17, Gujarat’s 71% girls are enrolled at the secondary and higher secondary level, which is worse than 20 out of 22 major states for which data have been made available.

Congress 'promises' cancellation of Adani power project: Jharkhand elections

Counterview Desk
Pointing out that people's issues take a backseat in Jharkhand's 2019 assembly elections, the state's civil rights organization, the Jharkhand Janadhikar Mahasabha, a coalition of activists and people’s organisations, has said that political parties have largely ignored in their electoral manifestos the need to implement the fifth schedule of the Constitution in a predominantly tribal district.

Gujarat refusal to observe Maulana Azad's birthday as Education Day 'discriminatory'

By Our Representative
The Gujarat government decision not to celebrate the National Education Day on !monday has gone controversial. Civil society organizations have particularly wondered whether the state government is shying away from the occasion, especially against the backdrop of "deteriorating" level of education in Gujarat.

Hindutva founders 'borrowed' Nazi, fascist idea of one flag, one leader, one ideology

By Shamsul Islam*
With the unleashing of the reign of terror by the RSS/BJP rulers against working-class, peasant organizations, women organizations, student movements, intellectuals, writers, poets and progressive social/political activists, India also witnessed a series of resistance programmes organized by the pro-people cultural organizations in different parts of the country. My address in some of these programmes is reproduced here...
*** Before sharing my views on the tasks of artists-writers-intellectuals in the times of fascism, let me briefly define fascism and how it is different from totalitarianism. Totalitarianism is political concept, a dictatorship of an individual, family or group which prohibits opposition in any form, and exercises an extremely high degree of control over public and private life. It is also described as authoritarianism.
Whereas fascism, while retaining all these repressive characteristics, also believes in god-ordained superiority of race, cultur…

Ex-World Bank chief economist doubts spurt in India's ease of doing business rank

By Rajiv Shah
This is in continuation of my previous blog where I had quoted from a commentary which top economist Prof Kaushik Basu had written in the New York Times (NYT) a little less than a month ago, on November 6, to be exact. He recalled this article through a tweet on November 29, soon after it was made known that India's growth rate had slumped (officially!) to 4.5%.

With RSS around, does India need foreign enemy to undo its democratic-secular fabric?

By Shamsul Islam*
Many well-meaning liberal and secular political analysts are highly perturbed by sectarian policy decisions of RSS/BJP rulers led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, especially after starting his second inning. They are vocal in red-flagging lynching incidents, policies of the Modi government on Kashmir, the National Register of Citizens (NRC), the demand for 'Bharat Ratna' to Savarkar who submitted 6-7 mercy petitions to the British masters (getting remission of 40 years out of 50 years' sentence), and the murder of constitutional norms in Goa, Karnataka and now in Maharashtra.

Rushdie, Pamuk, 260 writers tell Modi: Aatish episode casts chill on public discourse

Counterview Desk
As many as 260 writers, journalists, artists, academics and activists across the world, including Salman Rushdie, British Indian novelist, Orhan Pamuk, Turkish novelist and recipient of the 2006 Nobel Prize in literature, and Margaret Atwood, Canadian poet and novelist, have called upon Prime Minister Narendra Modi to review the decision to strip British Indian writer Aatish Taseer of his overseas Indian citizenship.

Post-Balakot, danger that events might spiral out of control is 'greater, not less'

By Tapan Bose*
The fear of war in South Asia is increasing. Tensions are escalating between India and Pakistan after the Indian defence minister's announcement in August this year that India may revoke its current commitment to only use nuclear weapons in retaliation for a nuclear attack, known as ‘no first use’. According to some experts who are watching the situation the risk of a conflict between the two countries has never been greater since they both tested nuclear weapons in 1998.

Worrying signs in BJP: Modi, Shah begin 'cold-shouldering' Gujarat CM, party chief

By RK Misra*
The political developments in neighbouring Maharashtra where a Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress government assumed office has had a trickle down effect in Gujarat with both the ruling BJP and the Congress opposition going into revamp mode.

'Favouring' tribals and ignoring Adivasis? Behind coercion of India's aborigines

By Mohan Guruswamy*
Tribal people account for 8.2% of India’s population. They are spread over all of India’s States and Union Territories. Even so they can be broadly classified into three groupings. The first grouping consists of populations who predate the Indo-Aryan migrations. These are termed by many anthropologists as the Austro-Asiatic-speaking Australoid people.

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