tagged w/ Orissa
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Four elephants, allegedly poisoned, dead in Assam
Kishalay Bhattacharjee, Updated: October 12, 2010 16:38 IST
Guwahati: The fringes of the Kaziranga National Park have turned into deadly territory.
In the last few days, four elephants - two of them calves - have been found dead in the area, the most recent was discovered in the Panbari Reserve Forest. All are suspected to have died of poisoning.
Panbari is one of the most important animal corridors in the country, but the corridor has been choked with more than a hundred stone quarries.
The impact of that on wildlife is compounded by the tea estates in the area which chemical pesticides and toxic weedicides.
It's not clear whether the poisioning was deliberate. But the conflict between elephants and humans has been rising. This year, elephant herds from near-by Karbianglong have destroyed fully-grown rice paddy in at least ten villages in Kaziranga.
In September, the government announced that the elephant would be given National Heritage Animal status, which would entitle it to the same level of protection as the tiger. A task force set up to draft policy has presented an agenda that tackles the diversifying conflict with humans, as well as the loss of habitat. However, it has not touched upon the issue of pesticides in eco-sensitive zones.
"There is no measure as of now and we have enough laws, it's the implementation which is lacking," says Rathin Barman, Coordinator of the Wildlife Trust of India.
Last month, pictures of seven elephants run over by a speeding train in Siliguri in West Bengal had people all over the country cringing. It also became a sore point between the Railways Ministry and Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh.
Read more at: http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/four-elephants-die-in-five-days-in-assam-59091?cpFour elephants, allegedly poisoned, dead in Assam
Kishalay Bhattacharjee,... more
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P Chidambaram seems to have repeated the same blunder that was committed by Rajiv Gandhi in trying to get V Prabhakaran shot dead at the behest of some foolish trigger-happy top Indian military brass. It’s true that the human rights activist Swami Agnivesh has put up a brave face by saying that the Azad’s death shall not be allowed to derail the peace process initiated by Swami Agnivesh in trying to bring a truce between the Indian Government and the CPI [Maoist]. But, the unpalatable truth is that the Congress/UPA has proved once again that the majority of the Indian politicians are really immature morons who cannot handle and resolve internal Indian political problems peacefully. Yes, the majority of the Indian politicians are excellently superb in taking care of their own personal interests even if these interests meant derailing the supreme Indian national interests.
The major chunk of the Indian politicians [whether those in ruling government or in opposition] wants the Indian democracy to function only for the exclusive benefit of the select political-bureaucratic-antisocial elements' network in India. Sushma Swaraj has called for Army action against the Maoists. But, she forgets that not long back there were posters/material in New Delhi that had suggested of Sushma’s links with Dawood Ibrahim Kaskar, the notorious Indian smuggler’s underworld.
The Congress/UPA had earlier used the shoulders of P Chidambaram to try to silence the voice of the civil society and human rights workers in India in terms of P Chidambaram having threatened to put all people [who expressed their candid and frank views on Maoist-Indian Government issue] by putting them into jails under various Indian laws. Well, if these Indian laws were to be applied sincerely, P Chidambaram himself would turn out to be the first person to be dubbed a goonda and put behind bars for having threatened, civil society, like a goon!
Also, the Congress/UPA shall have to put Digvijay Singh, the AICC general secretary, into jail for having challenged P Chidambaram on the vexing Naxal-Maoist issue. Then, the Congress/UPA shall have to put the management/correspondents of all the Indian newspapers like The Times Of India, etcetra for the later having published articles/views on this issue…P Chidambaram shall have to die and go to heaven if he [P Chidambaram] wished to bring back VP Singh, the former Indian Prime Minister to be put into the Indian Jail for VP Singh having commented some time before his death [comments were published in the Times Of India] during the meet at a slum that he [VP Singh] was so annoyed with the corruption in the system [Indian Government] that he [VP Singh] would pick up a gun and become a naxalite if he [VP Singh] were still young in age!
As regards the Maoist-Naxal issue in India, it’s a political problem and not a simple law and order issue. The Congress/UPA and opportunist opposition Indian political leaders have tried to wrongly project it as a law and order problem. The real problem is the majority of the Indian politicians themselves who seem to be considering their excellent political fortune as a divine right for ever to trample upon the rights of the ordinary citizenry/tribals. Why will your own citizen in general pick up a gun against you if you take care of your citizen’s genuine needs, desires and aspirations?
Well, this lesson seems to have been lost upon most of the Indian politicians. That’s why we see that the Indian nation-State has been at war against its own people since Indian independence in 1947. It’s true that most Indian politicians would love to see that you don’t see this true picture of the Indian polity.
The Indian government has waged wars and is still continuing wars against its own Indian people. Examples are numerous – Kashmir, Goa, Hyderabad, Nagaland, Mizoram, Assam, Punjab, West Bengal, Jharkhand, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa. Although the Indian Government and state governments of Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa, Chhattisgarh and West Bengal would like you to believe and even I myself would have liked to believe that Maoist issue were a law and order problem yet it were not so. The Factual reality is that it is an armed conflict in the aforesaid 5 states – irrespective of whether the majority of the Indian politicians would like to admit publically this factual reality or not. So, the United Nations Organization seems to have fully correctly designated the Indian government-Maoist conflict as the Armed Conflict and has wisely refused to accept it as a law and order problem.P Chidambaram seems to have repeated the same blunder that was committed by Rajiv... more
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The recent cold-blooded murder of AZAD and his colleague Hem Pandey, both belonging to CPI [MAOIST], in a blatantly cold-blooded fake encounter in Adilabad Forests bordering Andhra-Maharashtra by the Andhra Pradesh police, in all possibility under instructions from P Chidambaram, the home minister of India, has only confirmed further the deep suspicions raised earlier by Ms Mayawati, the UP CM, regarding the ruling Indian National Congress’ intentions about dealing with the Naxalites-Maoist issue in India.
As per the Maoist statement, “on June 1 [2010], the Andhra Pradesh Special Branch Police…arrested Com Azad, politburo member and spokesperson of CPI [Maoist] and Com Hem Pandey, a zonal committee level comrade, in Nagpur city around 11 am when they went to meet a comrade who was supposed to receive them from Dandakarnya zone. Azad reached Nagpur around 10 am on the fateful day along with Hem Pandey, after travelling a long distance…with specific information, the APSIB [Andhra Pradesh State Intelligence Bureau] abducted them, perhaps flew them in a helicopter, to Adilabad jungle near Maharashtra border and killed them.”
Going by the media reports in the mainstream Indian newspapers, it’s fully clear that the politburo member and spokesperson of the CPI [Maoist], Shri Cherukuri Rajkumar alias Azad was planning to discuss truce dates. A statement by the CPI [Maoist] said, “Azad was going to discuss with our comrades, concrete proposals of well-meaning people like Swami Agnivesh about particular dates for the mutual ceasefire.”
The statement added, “Will Chidambaram expect CPI (Maoist) to sit for talks with blood on his hands, of Com Azad and Com Hem Pandey?”
Does the Congress/UPA combine really wish for a truce with the Maoists-Naxals? The brazen unwanted killing of Azad, the key Truce-mediator, at the behest of the Centre seems unfortunately to indicate otherwise. It’s a time-honoured/pragmatic standard practice not to kill the DUUTA [MESSENGER] who generally acts as a go-between two warring parties. The DUUTA is often a soft target. In this case, Azad was treated probably to be a soft target by P Chidambaram who got him killed as a revenge for the heat unleashed by the Maoist attacks on the paramilitary forces like the CRPF in revenge for crimes perpetrated on the innocent tribals by the Indian security forces.
Well, P Chidambaram has foolishly lost an opportunity to deal peacefully with the Maoists by having Azad killed. It is something akin to the Maoist killing P Chidambaram to avenge the killing and torture of the tribals at the hands of the security forces in which case the Centre might refuse talks with the Maoists. OR IS IT THAT THE CONGRESS/UPA COMBINE DOESN’T WANT TO HAVE A NEGOTIATED PEACE SETTLEMENT WITH THE MAOISTS? The killing of Azad seems to suggest so.
It seems to be an old foolish-policy-blunder-mechanism that the Congress always has used.
Remember the recent TV interview in which one retired Indian army general had boasted as to how he had convinced Rajiv Gandhi, the then Indian PM, to get V Prabhakaran, the LTTE chief wiped out, a strategy based on which only, V Prabhakaran was shot at by the Indian snipers when V Prabhakaran had come to meet the Indian high commissioner to Sri Lanka prior to the outbreak of a full-fledged hostility between the LTTE and the IPKF?
Luckily for V Prabhakaran, the Indian snipers failed to kill him. But, this treacherous act by Indian politicians made V Prabhakaran a sworn enemy of Rajiv Gandhi that culminated in the revenge-death of Rajiv Gandhi by the LTTE operatives. Also, that very treacherous act deprived the suffering Lankan Tamils of any Indian help in terms of the Indian National Congress having harboured animosity towards V Prabhakaran after Rajiv Gandhi’s death. This chain of events probably made the ruling Congress-led UPA to give silent approval to Mahinda Rajpaksa, the Sri Lankan President who ruthlessly got his military then kill more than 20,000 innocent Lankan Tamils to overcome the resistance by the LTTE, a little prior to the 2009 Indian General elections.
Although, the Congress/UPA would not like to admit it yet the fact seems to be that the Congress/UPA feared that the NDA-led coalition might win 2009 elections and as such Congress/UPA would lose a golden chance to get V Prabhakaran wiped out, even if the wiping out of the later meant human rights violation for more than 20,000 innocent Lankan Tamils who were then going to be butchered by the Lankan military within a time of few weeks.The recent cold-blooded murder of AZAD and his colleague Hem Pandey, both belonging to... more
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What will one tribe have to do to save everything they know?
Mine, narrated by Joanna Lumley, tells the story of the remote Dongria Kondh tribe's struggle to protect the mountain they worship as a God.
London-based mining company Vedanta Resources plans a vast open-cast bauxite mine in India's Niyamgiri hills, and the Dongria Kondh know that means the destruction of their forests, their way of life, and their mountain God.
They need your support. Take action and spread this film:
http://www.survival-international.org/films/mineWhat will one tribe have to do to save everything they know?
Mine, narrated by... more
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A NUN in eastern India has spoken out for the first time on live television about allegations she was gang-raped by more than 40 men in August, accusing police of complicity in Hindu attacks on Christians.A NUN in eastern India has spoken out for the first time on live television about... more
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