Jaitley's "outburst" against judiciary suggests he is feeling sidelined under Modi: Ex-Gujarat BJP CM Suresh Mehta

By Our Representative
In a scathing letter to Union finance minister Jaitley, former BJP chief minister of Gujarat, Suresh Mehta, has said that Jaitley’s recent outpourings (click HERE) against thejudiciary is the direct result of what he calls BJP’s “flamboyant Rajya Sabha MP” Subramaniam Swamy’s attacks on him.
“Shocked” to read Jaitley’s statement in the Rajya Sabha (May 11, 2016), where he said that the judiciary is destroying the edifice of India’s legislature “step by step, brick by brick”, Mehta, in his four-page letter to Jaitley, release to media, says, “Prime Minister Narendra Modi appears keen to pit Swamy against you.”
Recalling how Swamy recently alleged in a recent TV interview that Jaitley was trying to “undermine the investigation into AugustaWesland chopper scam” amidst reports that Swamy may be replaced as India’s finance minister, Mehta tells Jaitley, “I wonder if you are feeling nervous."
Mehta – who became compromise Gujarat chief minister in October 1995 following a rebellion against the then chief minister Keshubhai Patel, led by current Congress leader Shankarsinh Vaghela and reportedly engineered by Narendra Modi – resigned from the BJP in December 2007.
Mehta says in his letter, “Your statement particularly acquires significance as it comes one day after the BJP lost the floor test in Uttarakhand, thanks to Supreme Court intervention.”
Regretting that the statement accusing the judiciary has come from “an eminent and perceptive Supreme Court advocate”, Mehta, who has been a lawyer by profession, says, “It is not the judiciary which is seeking to undermine the executive or the legislature. Rather, it is the executive, led by Modi, which is seeking to destroy the independence of judiciary.”
Providing instances, Mehta says, its first indication was in April 2015, when the Prime Minister told a joint conference of Chief Ministers and Chief Justices of High Courts that India’s courts “need to be cautious against perception-driven verdicts", accusing “five star activists" of being the resource persons for providing material for such verdicts.
“Modi’s statement on ‘perception-driven verdict’ came just around the time when clean chit was sought to be given to BJP president Amit Shah, one of the prime accused in two of the most notorious fake encounter cases of Gujarat -- Sohrabuddin Shaikh and Ishrat Jahan”, Mehta says.
“The whole effort of the Prime Minister was to drive home the point that the judiciary should not go by the ‘perception’ supposedly held by activists that a criminal politician, who acts behind the scene, is responsible for crimes committed on the ground”, Mehta says.
In a second instance, Mehta says, the Modi government has been “stalling the appointment of around 170 judges to High Courts, recommended by the Supreme Court collegium”, with the perception having gone strong that “this is happening because the Supreme Court struck down its efforts to take under it wings all the powers of appointing judges through a National Judicial Appointments Commission.”
“Clearly, the government appears not very keen to allow smooth functioning of the Supreme Court collegium, which has the powers to appoint judges. In fact, it wants to have a say in recommending names of candidates, insisting that the Memorandum of Procedure (MoP) for appointing judges”, Mehta says, referring to recent reports on government’s suggestions for MoP.

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Green revolution "not sustainable", Bt cotton a failure in India: MS Swaminathan

Counterview Desk
In a recent paper in the journal “Current Science”, distinguished scientist PC Kesaven and his colleague MS Swaminathan, widely regarded as the father of the Green Revolution, have argued that Bt insecticidal cotton, widely regarded as the continuation of the Green Revolution, has been a failure in India and has not provided livelihood security for mainly resource-poor, small and marginal farmers.
Sharply taking on Green Revolution, the authors say, it has not been sustainable largely because of adverse environmental and social impacts, insisting on the need to move away from the simplistic output-yield paradigm that dominates much thinking. Seeking to address the concerns about local food security and sovereignty as well as on-farm and off-farm social and ecological issues associated with the Green Revolution, they argue in favour of what they call sustainable ‘Evergreen Revolution’, based on a ‘systems approach’ and ‘ecoagriculture’.
Pointing out that Evergreen Revol…

Rejoinder: Inescapable to have Central Water Commission as strong technical body in India

By BN Navalawala*
This is with reference to Counterview Blog (December 5, 2018), "Modi govt 'shelves' water reforms report, shows 'no interest' in its recommendations", below mentioned are my comments/observations thereon:
A committee was constituted under the Chairmanship of Dr. Mihir Shah, Former Member, Planning Commission, for restructuring of Central Water Commission (CWC) and Central Ground Water Board (CGWB) for optimal development of water resources in the country in the backdrop of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM).

Some Hindu bodies in US defending BJP-RSS' divisive, violent activities: Agnivesh

Counterview Desk Last week, Washington DC saw speakers at a religious freedom roundtable, chaired by the US Ambassador for Religious Freedom, Sam Brownback, express concern over "eroding" space for religious freedom in India. Dr Mike Ghouse, executive director, of the Center for Pluralism in Washington DC, referring to the roundtable, said in an email alert that Indian-Americans have "a moral duty to prevent India from being labeled as a Country of Particular Concern by the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF)".

Preventing childhood deaths: India performs worse than Bangladesh, "equals" Pakistan

By Rajiv Shah
A just-released study, “The Pneumonia and Diarrhea Progress Report 2018”, prepared by the International Vaccine Access Centre (IVAC) at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, has identified India among 15 other countries which are still far off the mark in achieving the targets of the Global Action Plan for the Prevention of Pneumonia and Diarrhea (GAPPD).

Karnataka: NGO Akshay Patra "not sensitive" to nutrition demands of school children

Counterview Desk
Well-known civil rights organizations, Right to Food Campaign and Jan Swasthya Abhiyan, have sent a letter to the Union minister of human resource development, the Chief Minister of Karnataka, other concerned ministers and officials of the state expressing concerns regarding the mid-day meal (MDM) to school children, insisting, all contracts to the Akshay Patra for supply of MDM should be immediately terminated.

India's rewritten textbooks talk of demerits of democracy, praise Hitler, underrate Mughals

Counterview Desk
A detailed, 3,800-word review of the books rewritten under directions of the BJP rulers across India since Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to power in May 2014 has suggested that one of aims of the books is to instill a sense of doubt about India’s democratic polity among the country’s young minds. Reviewed in the prestigious US journal, “The New York Review of Books”, in its latest issue (December 6, 2018) by Alex Traub, the scrutiny insists, the effort has also been to paint Indian history from the angle of “Hindu triumphalism”, even as creating “Islamophobia”.

Govt of India "tarnishing" NGO reputation, dossier leaked selectively: Amnesty

Counterview Desk
Amnesty International India has said that a deliberate attempt is being made to tarnish its reputation by leaking a dossier, supposedly made by investigating agencies, to media without giving it access to any such information. The high profile NGO’s claim follows a Times Now report about proceedings launched by investigative agencies, including Enforcement Directorate (ED) against the rights body for “violations” of rules pertaining to overseas donations.

World Bank clarifies: Its 26th rank to India not for universal access to power but for ease of doing business

By Our Representative
In a major embarrassment to the Government of India, the World Bank has reportedly clarified that it has not ranked India 26th out of 130 countries for providing power to its population. The top international banker’s clarification comes following Union Power Minister Piyush Goyal’s claim that India has “improved to 26 position from 99” in access to electricity in just one year.

Four children die after poor UP Dalit, Muslim families forced to flee to forest area: PVCHR

Counterview Desk
Peoples’ Vigilance Committee on Human Rights (PVCHR) has said that the forest department police’s crackdown, allegedly without any prior notice, on Dalit and Muslim households in Dakhin Tola, Churk Bazaar, Sonbhadra district, Uttar Pradesh, beating up “children and old people, women, and men in an inhuman way”, has led to “forced displacement, starvation and discrimination”. This has reportedly affected about 350 people.

Vedanta is out but corporate loot continues in Odisha: Local activists tell NAPM yatra

By Our Representative
Lok Shakti Abhiyan leader Prafulla Samantara, winner of the Goldman Environmental (also known as Green Nobel) Prize in 2017, has regretted that though Sundergarh in Odisha, like other forest areas, is a fifth schedule area, where Forest Rights Act (FRA) and Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act (PESA) is applicable, but these laws are being “outrightly violated to facilitate corporate loot.”

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