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[1] Miscreants Manhandle Two Presentation Novices in Bhopal BHOPAL : Evening around 6.30 pm a group of miscreants ransacked the Novitiate of the Presentation Sisters. They assaulted two of its inmates. The incident took place on Thursday, 15th May 2008, at Gondarmug village under the Gandhinagar Police Station area in the outskirts of Bhopal . The convent is working for the lower section of the people since six years. The Sisters lodged a police complaint immediately against the unidentified persons at Gandhi Nagar police station. On following day morning police arrested nine persons under section 147 , 452 , 426 and 502 of the IPC. Senior police officials and district officials visited the spot late evening on the same evening. While narrating the incident, Superior of the convent Sister Silvya Francis told, “the miscreants numbering 30 first forced their way into the convent campus. Then 12 of them barged into the convent through the main door and began to destroy the window panes, television set, lantern and other furniture.” The lose is estimated to be around one lakh. They were armed with hockey sticks, cricket bats and stones, she said adding they vandalized the convent for 12 minutes. They also climbed up the first floor of the two storied building and dragged two of the novices down and manhandled them. Besides this, they tried to lock one of them into a room. However, both managed to escape from them. They had also disconnected the telephone line before entering into the campus. The convent is the novitiate house of Sister of Presentation since six years. One of the novices said , “ they were shouting at sisters saying, “we are Hindus and we don’t want you here” They also asked them to leave the place, she added. Reacting to the incident the Spokes person of the Catholic Church in Madhya Pradesh said, “it is really sad to see the deteriorating religious harmony along with law and order. The state Government have failed to follow the High Court interim direction to provide security to Christian community, we will approach the court again because after the court direction there are around ten such incidents in Madhya Pradesh.” Meanwhile a delegation comprising of office bearers of Madhya Pradesh Isai Mahasangh Mr. Roy John Thatta , Mr. Richard D’ Silva , senior journalist and Convener of Rashtriya Secular Manj, Mr. L S Herdenia , and PRO & Spokesperson of Catholic Church Fr. Anand Muttungal , met the collector Mr. Manish Rasthyogi and Suprindent of Police Mr. Jaydeep Prasad. They have assured strict action on the accused. He also told that he will look into the damage happened to the building.” Mr. Richard D’Silva , General Secretary of the Madhya Pradesh Isai Mahasangh has asked the Government to provide security to the Christian community otherwise we may have to take to the streets. Fr. Anand Muttungal PRO & Spokesperson Catholic Council of Bishops M. P & C. G ------------ [2] From: kashif-ul-huda <kaaashif@gmail.com Date: Fri May 16, 2008 8:26 pm Subject: An innovative approach to Hindu-Muslim An innovative approach to Hindu-Muslim dialogue<http://twocircles.net/2008may15/innovative_approach_hindu_muslim_dialog\ ue. html <http://twocircles.net/2008may15/innovative_approach_hindu_muslim_dialogue.html *By Yoginder Sikand, TwoCircles. net* 55 year-old Syed Abdullah Tariq runs an Islamic group based in Rampur, a town in western Uttar Pradesh, that focuses on dialogue with Hindus. An engineer by training, he was one of the chief disciples of the late Maulana Shams Naved Usmani, a noted Islamic scholar who had also a deep knowledge of the Hindu scriptures. Tariq collected and published the thoughts and sayings of Maulana Usmani in the form of several books in Urdu and Hindi, the most well-known of these being 'Agar Abhi Na Jagey To', later translated into English under the title 'Now Or Never'. Maulana Usmani and Tariq have been one of the pioneers of a particular Islamic approach to dialogue with Hindus, one that is based on the commonalities that they perceived in Islam and Hinduism. In a recent meeting in Rampur, Tariq related his own story and his association with Maulana Usmani to Yoginder Sikand --------------- [3] From: yogi sikand <ysikand@yahoo.com Date: Fri May 16, 2008 10:21 pm Subject: Terrorist bombings: A failure of Indian Intelligence--Kashif ul Huda Terrorist bombings: A failure of Indian Intelligence Kashif-ul-Huda The popular Indian tourist city Jaipur was hit with a series of bomb blasts on Tuesday resulting in over 80 people dead. Outside of the troubled regions of Jammu and Kashmir and the North-East, this is the tenth terror bombing in India targeting civilians since 2005. In what is now all too familiar, blame game and finger pointing have started after these blasts as well. While the law enforcements promise to deliver, Indians have increasingly becoming more insecure at the moment when they are poised to play a bigger role internationally. After each of these blasts Indian authorities have blamed Pakistan or Bangladesh based terrorists for these attacks. While accusing ‘Islamic’ terror groups for these attacks, law enforcement agencies start arresting Muslim youths of the area, in many instances torturing them. None of those arrested have ever proven guilty for any of these terrorist acts. Indian Muslims were once proudly showcased internationally by the Indian Prime Minister for the fact that they were free from terrorist activities. In 2006 when visiting India, President Bush remarked to his wife that "Not one Indian Muslim has joined Al Qaeda." Since 2005 a new wave of terrorist attacks in India was blamed on Islamic groups originating in Pakistan and Bangladesh. Slowly the blame shifted to Muslims of India because they were thought to be providing local support to these terrorists. Indian Muslims have increasingly come under pressure from the media, law enforcement agencies and right wing Hindu groups. Indian madrasas became a special focus of attention of these groups. In response, the Darul Uloom at Deoband, one of the oldest and largest seminaries of Islamic learning in the country, recently organized an anti-terrorism conference attended by a large number of Muslims scholars. This gathering issued a fatwa against terrorism, declaring it to be against Islamic teachings. These conferences are now being organized in many parts of the country. This is a sign of desperation and the only thing a powerless community under siege can do. Many Muslims find it difficult to believe that some among them may have resorted to terrorism. Given that several series of raids and detentions by the state authorities have never resulted in any conviction Muslims of India have reasons to suspect that they are being unfairly targeted. For their part the Indian intelligence agencies seem to have failed miserably to prevent or solve these terror strikes, a large number of them designed to create tensions between Hindus and Muslims by targeting their places of worship. Since 2006, four mosques and two temples have been targeted. Indian law enforcement agencies have arrested a large number of Muslims after every blast but none of the investigations have so far led to disruption of any terrorist group in India. In three years, terrorists have struck India in the East, West, South and North. These bombings have been of low to medium intensity blasts. In most of these cases, ammonium nitrate was used as an explosive material, pointing to a local group. RDX, another explosive material, can only be obtained through army contacts or through an international link. Use of easy to obtain ammonium nitrate and the modus operandi of these terror bombings suggest a local group with limited resources. Terrorists have used bicycles or bags to plant bombs in crowded public places. To increase the impact of their low to medium intensity bombs, terrorists have strategically chosen the targets—mosques on Friday and temples on Tuesday— to kill the maximum number of people. The bombs were packed with metallic objects to increase the lethal power of the explosions. In most cases, some of these bombs have been found unexploded, potentially providing valuable clues to the police. But these clues have not lead to solving of any of these terrorism cases. The intensity or frequency of bombings shows no sign of slowing down pointing to the miserable failure of Indian security agencies. Muslim and some secular organizations say that these investigations have failed because investigators have been looking for leads in all the wrong places. Some like human rights activist Teesta Setalvad says that linking Islam with terrorism is nothing but a well planned conspiracy against Muslims. They believe that the most to gain from these attacks are extremist Hindu groups, also knows as Hindutva groups, so known for their ideology of Hindutva which claims India is for Hindus. There have been confirmed cases of their involvement in at least some of the blasts. In April 2006, a bomb blast in Nanded, Maharashtra in the house of a Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS, parent body of all Hindutva groups) activist first alerted secular groups to the possibility of their involvement in terror bombings. Two Bajrang Dal members died in that blasts reportedly during making of the bombs. Bajrang Dal is a militant associate of the RSS. Just last month, Home Minister of India Shivraj Patel informed the Parliament that Maharashtra police, anti-terrorist squad, and India’s premier investigating agency Central Bureau of Investigations have come to the same conclusion that some Bajrang Dal members were involved in Nanded blasts. In September of the same year, three bombs exploded in Malegaon, a Muslim majority city of Maharashtra. Local witnesses reported recovering a dead body with a fake beard on it, suggesting that terrorist disguised themselves as Muslims to plant the bombs. The bombing was timed to coincide with a Muslim festival when the targeted mosque and the graveyard were full of people. In June of 2007, a low intensity blast in a Muslim majority area of Assam that killed one and wounded 40 person was initially blamed on Assam militants United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) but in a very unusual statement ULFA denied the responsibility and blamed the RSS for the bombing. In July of last year, a former chief minister of Madhya Pradesh, Mr. Digvijay Singh, issued a statement that bombs and explosive materials was recovered from RSS sympathizers in that state. He has repeated his statement since and has demanded a ban on Hindutva organizations. Of all these blasts linked to Hindutva groups, the investigating agencies have not tried to work their way up to the organization to find out the masterminds or the conspiracy. Meanwhile, the blasts have continued; in the south of the country, in January of this year, Tenkasi a small town in Tamilnadu witnessed two bomb blasts—one targeting the local RSS office and another one a bus stop. No one was killed in these attacks but Hindutva groups organized demonstrations to create tension between Hindus and Muslims. The Tamil Nadu police investigated the blasts and arrested seven Hindus as responsible for them. All of them were been found to be RSS activists, and one of them is the General Secretary of a local RSS front, the Hindu Munani. All this and the continued incidents of terrorist bombings in India have increased the demand for an impartial and effective investigation that looks at all clues and leads. Muslims have long argued that biased investigations have resulted in harassment of Muslims and have not resulted in any positive outcome. The latest bomb blasts in Jaipur are a proof of that. A group of prominent intellectuals and peace activists, comprising of Asghar Ali Engineer, Ram Puniyani and several others, have demanded that a National Commission be set up to monitor the progress of investigations into these bomb blasts cases. This might help speed up the process of investigations, find valuable clues to catch the culprits, provide justice to the victims, and prevent future attacks. Kashif-ul-Huda is the editor of news website www. twocircles. net . He can be contacted on kaaashif@gmail.com ----------- |
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May17, 2008 - [India Thinkers Net]Women in Nepal ,Bengal CPM ,Binayak Sen etc >> |
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