ISSUES AND CONCERNS ಸಮಸ್ಯೆಗಳ ಮೇಲೆ ಕ್ಷಕಿರಣ

IDEA OF JUSTICE: FROM TARUN TEJPAL TO FRANCO MULAKKAL G. Gopakumar, a judge of an additional session court in Kottayam, Kerala, an important hub of various church denominations, has reportedly acquitted disgraced, defrocked former catholic bishop Franco Mulakkal. He was an accused of repeatedly raping a nun under his charge. Judge G. Gopakumar cited, failure of the prosecution to establish the crime, for the eventual acquittal of Franco Mulakkal by the additional session court in Kottayam. Reportedly, this Franco Mulakkal is the first Catholic Bishop in the country to have faced trial on the rape charge. It was on 27th June 2018, the victim of Bishop Mulakkal’s lust had complained at the Kuravilangad Police station in Kottayam, that she was sexually assaulted 14 times by this bishop between May, 2014 and 2016. Some 5 nuns took to fasting under the aegis of Joint Christian Council (JCC), demanding arrest of Franco Mulakkal. JCC had blamed authorities in Kerala for no-action despite many...

NEW DELHI: Has the democracy gone berserk in India? It’s a strange and crazy question. But frankly India is slipping badly in ethical standard needed for a vibrant democracy. It is demo-crazy or else nothing can explain why there are close to 5000 cases pending against MPs and MLAs in the highest court of the land. A New Delhi datelined print media report informs that amicus curiae, senior advocate Vijay Hansaria has informed the Supreme Court that as of December 2021, there are 4984 cases pending against sitting and former MPs and MLAs. Reportedly it was 4110 in December 2018, now increased by over 20% since then. According to Sr. Advocate Vijay Hansaria, the author of the report to the Apex Court, shockingly there are cases pending for more than three decades against these people's elected representatives. Report informs that of the 4984 pending cases, 3999 cases were against MLAs of which 1675 were against former legislators, leaving 2324 against sitting MLAs. Interestingly in 1...

INDIAN HISTORY: SHOULD WE REWRITE IT! Sanjaan was a well known port in the Valsad district in the coastal Gujarat state. According to sources among Parsis, they migrated to India between the year 785 AD and 936 AD at the height of their persecution in their land of birth in the distant Persia, which is the later day Iran. They were a very prosperous, civilized and cultured community. They came in search of security of their persona and security for their faith. Having trusted their land of migration, they remained unconditionally faithful to the soil of their adoption and in return they remained completely protected in an atmosphere of peace and stability. Parsis prospered and flourished. Rest as the cliché goes, is a resplendent history and a glorious public knowledge. But sadly, did not find itself written into the pages of India’s evolving history. Why and how of it could be some interesting reading of some calculated disinformation/misinformation effort of some vested interest grou...

NEW DELHI: Since a week or so in the print media, electronic media and so also social media collectively called public space, the issue of rejection of tableau for display on 26th January Republic Day parade at Rajpath was making its interminable rounds. Earliest to make noise was the rejection of the tableau of Guru Narayana, a venerated social reformer of Kerala. Whether it was the Left government at Thiruvanantapuram or the most dominant community of Kerala, the Idiga’s, so also Billawas of Coastal Karnataka, all went to the market crying hoarse and rightly so. Clearly their feelings were hurt. Then comes Tamil Nadu with its history of the Southern State depicting “Tamil Nadu in the Freedom Struggle”, with heroes of the soil, beginning with highlighting the achievements of its legendary heroes and heroines, like V. O. Chidambaram (VOC) a.k.a. ‘Kappalottiya Thamizhan’, a pioneer in indigenous shipping company among the earliest to compete against the British. Reportedly the 150th bir...

SYED WASEEM RIZWI & ALI AKBAR CHANGING DYNAMICS OF AN EVOLVING INDIA & ITS RELEVANCE December 7, 2021, English newspapers carried a news item in its inside pages “Ex-Chief of Shia Waqf Board in UP converts to Hinduism”. One paper said “Wasim Rizwi is now Jitendra Narayan Singh Tyagi!”. Different papers titled it differently. But none of the papers coined their title as Ex-Chief of Shia Waqf Board leaves Islam or Wasim Rizwi has left Islam. What is important is not what he has become as from 7th December 2021. But why has he changed the status quo? What really made him to embrace another faith is less important than what forced him to give up a faith he was born into and practiced it for close to 50 years? There must have been some very pertinent, disturbing and profound reasons, disturbing to Syed Wasim Rizwi, more than anybody else. Another day and another individual. An eminent Malayalam film director, 58 years old Ali Akbar, announced on 11th December 2021 that he and his w...

NEW DELHI:Shashi Tharoor, the MP from Thiruvanantapuram has a fairly well deserved label of being an intellectual, besides a mastery in Queen’s English. But then, these accolades do not mean that people like Tharoor cannot lose a sense of proportion. And, that is exactly what happened with Shashi Tharoor recently. Speaking to Associated News of India, the Member of Parliament from Kerala is reported to have remarked “Citizenship Amendment Act is fundamentally anti-national”. Clearly he has decided to care less for logic and more for his kind of politics.Whatever the reason he is ascribing to this outlandish remark, he is clearly reading without the book. He needs to update his knowledge of the fundamental basis on which this particular enactment was deliberated and legislated. The Britishers partitioned the country because the Muslim League wanted their piece of land since they felt unsafe to live in a Hindu majority India. So Pakistan was created and most Muslims migrated to the ne...