Undemocratic, says tribal rights group as Gujarat govt disallows rally in Ahmedabad

A 2019 tribal show of strength in Ahmedabad

By A Representative

The Gujarat government has refused permission to the Ekalavya Sangathan for a tribal rally in Ahmedabad's Sabarmati Riverfront stating that it would "obstruct traffic". A Gujarat police letter to the tribal rights group claimed, the decision not to allow the rally has been taken following "negative opinion" to hold the convention.
"The Gujarat government and the Gujarat Police have behaved in an undemocratic and unconstitutional manner by not allowing the tribal rally to be held in Riverfront East at Ahmedabad on Thursday May 05, 2022", said Paulomee Mistry, who leads the Ekalavya Sangathan.
Mistry said, "The implementation of Forest Rights Act, MGNREGA and Food Security Act have been extremely lame in Gujarat. So the poor and unemployed tribals of the state wanted to gather in more than 10000 numbers to demand employment, food and land rights. The police have exposed their dictatorial mindset by not allowing tribals to hold conventions and peaceful rallies."
She wondered, "When the government claims that it has done a lot of welfare work for the tribals by giving advertisements worth crores of rupees, where is the justice in tribals of the state not being allowed to represent the details of development in the public interest?"
"Can only political leaders organise rallies?", Mistry asked, adding, "Doesn't the tribal community have a right to have their say? What kind of democracy is this? We had applied for permission for the last one month to the police and the officials of the Ahmedabad Police Commissioner."
She warned, "The answer to this will be given by the tribal community in the coming elections."

Manufacturing, services: India's low-skill, middle-skill labour remains underemployed

By Francis Kuriakose* The Indian economy was in a state of deceleration well before Covid-19 made its impact in early 2020. This can be inferred from the declining trends of four important macroeconomic variables that indicate the health of the economy in the last quarter of 2019.

Incarceration of Prof Saibaba 'revives' the question: What is crime, who is criminal?

By Kunal Pant* In 2016, a Supreme Court Judge asked the state of Maharashtra, “Do you want to extract a pound of flesh?” The statement was directed against the state for contesting the bail plea of Delhi University Professor GN Saibaba. Saibaba was arrested in 2014, a justification for which was to prevent him from committing what the police called “anti-national activities.”

Modi’s Israel visit strengthened Pakistan’s hand in US–Iran truce: Ex-Indian diplomat

By Jag Jivan M. K. Bhadrakumar , a career diplomat with three decades of service in postings across the former Soviet Union, Pakistan, Iran, Afghanistan, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Germany, and Turkey, has warned that the current truce in the US–Iran war is “fragile and ridden with contradictions.” Writing in his blog India Punchline , Bhadrakumar argues that while Pakistan has emerged as a surprising broker of dialogue, the durability of the ceasefire remains uncertain.

Search This Blog