It is always said that justice delayed is justice denied, the very fact that the criminal justice system in India takes decades to wind through and deliver justice. In that time, people either give up on justice, die, or implemented their own form of justice; conversely, it becomes easier to thwart justice by either witnesses being bought or scared away, their testimony becoming hazy, or witnesses simply not being present anymore. All these reduce the effectiveness of the judicial system as a way of delivering justice to society.
India has had a history of massive riots in the past, even starting from Partition where riots between Hindus and Muslims were horrendous in terms of casualties. After partition, there were cases of riots where the police and administration either were unable to control the riots, or played a partisan role. It is the cases where the administration played a partisan role that are a blot on society, and the inability to judicially address these crimes is actually criminal.
The 2 biggest such cases were the 1984 Sikh riots, and the 2002 Gujarat riots. In both cases, the administration let the riots happen (and it is accused with a lot of testimony and circumstantial evidence) that functionaries of the ruling party played a big role. In the 1984 riots, after Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her own bodyguards (who were Sikh), there were mobs of people (primarily in the city of Delhi) hunting down Sikhs (on the streets, and in their homes) and killing them by burning them or by cutting them down. Congress leaders (primarily HKL Bhagat, Sajjan Kumar, and Jagdish Tytler among the more well known) were accused of leading these mobs, and it was only after 2-3 days that the situation was brought under control.

continue reading "India – 3 people awarded life imprisonment in 1984 Sikh riots case"

Chelsea Clinton’s (wikipedia) dowry: 40 goats and 20 cows.
Now if you have finished laughing, this was actually a proposal made by a Kenyan man (Godwin Kipkemoi Chepkurgor). Giving livestock for gaining the hand of a girl in marriage is apparently proper in Kenya, and this offer was first made 9 years ago when the then President Clinton had visited Kenya. He renewed the offer when President Clinton’s wife, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Kenya, and she was told of the offer in an open session. What makes the offer even more interesting is that the man is already married, but it would be legal for him in Kenya to get a second wife. However, it would be quite apparent that he would have to wait for quite some time for Chelsea to agree to this proposal.
Maybe the man felt emboldened since now President Obama has kin in Kenya, and this would have made Godwin seem bolder. A secretary of state cannot be rude or be forcefully direct, so Hillary took the most politically correct answer in terms of stating that this would be Chelsea’s decision. (link to article):

continue reading "Humour: Kenyan offers animals for Chelsea Clinton"

The struggles following the Iranian election and the dispute over the ‘successful election’ of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were not crushed as was initially thought. At some point, when the Supreme Leader waded again into the controversy by first declaring the election as valid, and then actually calling for stringent action against the protests, the huge public rallies stopped. No longer were there sights of large number of Iranians coming out in the streets and protesting against the election, fighting with the police, with the Revolutionary guards and with the lumpen force of the Basij.

Opposition candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi also seemed to somewhat buckle down against the onslaught and withdrew his calls for public protests (he however did not endorse the election and continued calling it a fake). There were other movements in this area, with the clerical force being divided over whether to support the election or not. From behind the scenes, the former President Rafsanjani continued with his efforts, but not enough to win over the support of enough people to influence the situation.

At the same time, members of the Revolutionary Guards seem to have taken the calls for strong use of force literally, since they arrested a number of protesters and carted them off to prison, apparently without much involvement of the police force or the intelligence agencies. The Revolutionary Guards have become much more than a paramilitary force; they are now involved in the economy in various ways (including running industries and making money by the handful). Further, during the reign of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, they have apparently become much more powerful, with hints that they are actually now one of the major forces in Iran, and that the clerical establishment is not as powerful as it was thought.

It is the action of this force in the prisons that has become very controversial in the last few days, with people starting to be found to have been killed in these prisons during torture and interrogation. Under Islamic Iran (unlike other dictatorships), the wishes and apparent rights of the citizens have been always been important, and for people to be start getting killed in the prisons under torture has shaken the country. It reached such a degree that the Supreme Leader (and not the President or the Interior Minister) ordered closure of some of the more horrific prisons (link to article):

About 140 Iranians detained during protests against last month’s disputed election result have been released from Evin prison, officials say. The release comes after Iran’s supreme leader ordered the closure of another detention centre because it failed to “preserve the rights of detainees”. The unusual moves show how much pressure Iran’s leaders are under over detainees, correspondents say.
In recent days the opposition has reported almost every day new deaths of protestors held in prison. Iran’s prisons are notorious for their poor conditions, correspondents report. Former political prisoners, such as journalists and bloggers, have complained of human rights abuses such as solitary confinement, harsh interrogation tactics and even torture at Evin.

So even though it would seem that the President’s victory is now enforced with no opposition, there is apparently wide-spread disenchantment, and it would seem that protests happen on almost every occasion. In addition, the President also faced a huge issue when his choice for Vice-President was vetoed by the Supreme Leader and the President almost seemed to defy the Supreme Leader.

It is the wish of every US president to have a compliant Congress that will vote his way for the bills that he wants. Many Presidents have had the horror of having to veto bills that have been passed by Congress that they do not like, and also had the inverse effect of seeing their favorite initiatives doomed due to gridlock in Congress, and even worse, when the Congress is dominated by a party that is the opposite party of the President, every bill and initiative is an effort, with huge expenditure of political capital (Bill Clinton had to contend with a Congress that was dominated by the opposite Republican Party; and lately Bush had to content with a Democratic Majority in his last few months).
Even when the Opposition Party is not the dominant party, they still have the weapon of the ‘filibuster’ to block (or seriously delay) bills that they do not like. What is actually a dream for the President is when his party reaches the magic figure of 60 in the Senate (at which point the Opposition Party cannot even use that weapon). And this is a dream that Obama almost has in his grasp; with the announced decision of Senator Specter to cross over to the Democratic Party, and with the State Supreme Court judgment in the case of another Democratic candidate for Senatorship maybe heading towards the Democrats, the Senate may be heading towards a filibuster majority for the Democrats.

continue reading "The shift by Senator Specter – and what this means for US politics"