From: Peoples Media Advocacy & Resource Centre-PMARC <pmarc2008@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, Apr 3, 2010 at 5:24 PM
Subject: [PMARC] Dalits Media Watch - News Updates 03.04.10
To: Dalits Media Watch <PMARC@dgroups.org>
Dalits Media Watch
News Updates 03.04.10
JNU students' bodies call for a strike - The Hindu
http://www.hindu.com/2010/04/03/stories/2010040366590300.htm
Maya sacks Brahmin officials to woo Dalits - India Today
http://indiatoday.intoday.in/site/Story/91031/India/Maya+sacks+Brahmin+officials+to+woo+Dalits.html
Agra gears up for biggest Dalit empowerment show - Thaidian News
Karunanidhi for law to accord SC status to Dalit Christians - The Hindu
http://www.hindu.com/2010/04/03/stories/2010040365500900.htm
The One Rival - Out Look India
http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?264927
The Hindu
JNU students' bodies call for a strike
http://www.hindu.com/2010/04/03/stories/2010040366590300.htm
Staff reporter
| Against 'non-implementation' of quota in teachers' appointment |
· Quota issue is being referred back and forth between the EC and the Academic Council
· A demonstration will be held on Tuesday when the JNU Executive Council meeting will be held
April 03, 2010
NEW DELHI: Accusing the Jawaharlal Nehru University administration of not implementing reservations for teachers as supposedly required by law, several students' organisations have issued a joint statement calling for a university strike and demonstration at the University Grants Commission on Monday.
The statement also calls for a demonstration on Tuesday when the JNU Executive Council meeting will be held. At the meeting the issue of reservations for teachers from the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes at the associate professor and professor level and from the Other Backward Classes at the assistant professor level will reportedly be discussed.
The issue of reservations has for sometime being referred back and forth between the EC and the Academic Council.
The EC approved of the reservations in April 2007. Posts were accordingly advertised. This was opposed by some in the AC in November 2009. The matter was placed for consideration in the EC in January 2010. The matter was referred to the AC and currently has been report-edly referred to the EC once more.
After the last AC meeting finished on an inconclusive note with regard to reservations for teachers, another AC meeting was held on March 31, 2010.
The joint statement alleges that despite a majority support "in the AC that JNU should implement SC/ST reservations in all faculty posts, the JNU administration arbitrarily decided to 'seek legal opinion' from the Solicitor General".
All India Students' Association member Sucheta De said: "There are existing laws in place for implementing reservations. The laws have already been discussed in JNU, yet the matter is again being referred to the EC and the Solicitor General. How long will the law continue to be discussed?"
Various student organisations have accused the JNU administration of attempting to project the issue of reservations in faculty positions as "legally ambiguous".
Students have also written a letter of protest to Union Law and Justice Minister Veerappa Moily alleging that implementation of reservation for teachers was "under attack". Also the reservation for OBC students was implemented in JNU based on an arbitrary cut-off criterion, drastically reducing the number of OBC students in the university, the letter has claimed.
According to the RTI findings obtained by a JNU student, of the 486 faculty members from JNU, only 23 were appointed through the SC/ST quota. Further nobody belonging to the SC/ST category had been recruited for the post of associate professor and professor till date.
Also reportedly featuring in the agenda of the EC meeting on April 6 is extension of the term of the Vice-Chancellor. An AC member said: "Currently JNU allows the V-C to hold the post for a term of five years. At the EC meeting, it will be proposed to allow the V-C to hold the post for two terms. The current V-C can then seek a second term. But it is not necessary he will be chosen."
"A letter from the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development has been circulated to all Central Universities stating that if desired the university can take the matter to the EC to modify the statute concerned of the university act to allow two terms for the V-C," the member said.
India Today
Maya sacks Brahmin officials to woo Dalits
http://indiatoday.intoday.in/site/Story/91031/India/Maya+sacks+Brahmin+officials+to+woo+Dalits.html
Piyush Srivastava Lucknow,
April 3, 2010
Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayawati is switching the caste variables in her political calculus, replacing Brahmins with non-Yadav backward castes to consolidate her Dalit vote bank.
The early signs of a game-changing formula were visible in the sacking of 68 Brahmin public prosecutors and the appointment of 20 new Dalit ones a couple of days ago.
Call it the Rahul Gandhi effect on Dalit hamlets across the dusty countryside or the sobering impact of the 2009 parliamentary elections when 56 per cent of the Dalit electorate in UP did not vote. Mayawati first sidelined Satish Chandra Mishra, the Brahmin face of her Bahujan Samaj Party ( BSP). Top sources in the party insist she may not field most of her 42 Brahmin MLAs in the assembly polls two years from now.
A BSP coordinator for eastern UP said party workers had finally made Mayawati see the reality of an eroding mass base. "Behenji has realised that she has alienated about 50 percent of the Dalits by letting Brahmins run away with power and pelf. The Dalit-Brahmin combination which had helped her to ride to power in 2007 failed in 2009. We had complained to her after the Lok Sabha polls that though five out of 20 Brahmin BSP candidates won with Dalit votes, 15 out of our 17 Dalit candidates lost because they didn't get Brahmin votes," he alleged.
The BSP supremo had put up 86 Brahmin candidates in the 2007 Uttar Pradesh assembly elections.
Two years later, after the shock victory of 21 Congress candidates in the Lok Sabha elections, the BSP has reportedly come to the conclusion that Brahmins have refused to transfer their votes to the Dalit party and have gone back to the community's original icons, the Gandhis.
In this politics of diminishing returns, Mayawati seems to be dumping the Brahmins and seeking a new caste alliance.
Uttar Pradesh Congress spokesman Akhilesh Pratap Singh said Mayawati was angry with the Brahmins for shifting their allegiance to the Congress. "She is deserting the Brahmins because they are moving towards the Congress," he said.
Of the 145 public prosecutors she sacked on Tuesday, 68 were Brahmins and only three Dalits.
When she appointed 75 new prosecutors the next day, she made sure that 20 of them were Dalits. The number of Brahmins was just 18. Though she has brought in only 10 backward caste prosecutors, party insiders said she was searching for more.
Mayawati had earlier let Mishra farm out these jobs, which command immense local clout and social prestige to Brahmins, as a thanksgiving gesture for their support in 2007. But not any longer.
From the role of prime troubleshooter, Mishra has now been reduced to monitoring her cases in the Supreme Court. Additional cabinet secretary Vijay Shanker Pandey, the man who ran her bureaucracy, was shifted from the state capital to Allahabad as member of the revenue board.
Instead, Netram, a Dalit additional cabinet secretary, is now assigned to tame errant bureaucrats.
Mishra has been replaced by four second-rung leaders - PWD minister and party general secretary Nasimuddin Siddiqui, the party's Muslim face, mining minister Babu Singh Kushwaha, a backward caste leader, social welfare minister Indrajit Saroj and rural development minister Daddu Prasad, both Dalits.
Mayawati even sacked her Karnataka unit spokesman Y.N. Sharma, alleging that he let the details of her "cash garland" out by speaking out of turn. Sharma insists his dismissal too is part of a pattern.
"She used me as a Brahmin face in Karnataka during the Lok Sabha polls because I am a member of the All-India Brahmin Federation. She expelled me when she realised that the Brahmin-Dalit combination would not succeed in my state. She has decided to dump about 40 Brahmin MLAs in 2012 and increase the ratio of Dalits, Muslims and backward castes," Sharma claimed.
Dalits form approximately 21 per cent of the state's population, but the BSP cannot win polls with just Dalit votes. It will need the support of at least two more communities. If the Brahmins, supposed to be about 13 per cent, abandon her, she needs to look at the conglomeration of non-Yadav backward castes like Lodhs, Kurmis, Kushwahas and others, who add up to 20 per cent.
Sharma said Mayawati has been "terrified" of Rahul's visit to Dalit houses because this could lead to Dalits abandoning her and the Brahmins shifting to the Congress. Political analyst A.K. Verma said her only option now is to forge a Dalit-Mulsim-backward alliance.
Thaidian News
Agra gears up for biggest Dalit empowerment show
April 3rd, 2010 - 2:54 pm ICT by IANS -
Agra, April 3 (IANS) Agra is gearing up for the annual three-day Ambedkar Jayanti celebrations starting April 14 that are seen as a demonstration of Dalit empowerment over the past decades.Each year, a Bheem Nagri - the venue of the celebrations - comes up in a different area, Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) leader Arvind Pushkar told IANS.
"The main focus is on the Bheem Manch that has a new theme each year. Last year, it was the Parliament House. This year, the theme is Buddhist culture and trends," Pushkar added.
Towards this, new roads are being built, water and power supply lines being laid, and civic amenities in six villages behind the Taj Mahal are being updated and streamlined.
The Agra Development Authority, the Municipal Corporation, Awas Vikas and half a dozen other agencies are pouring in their resources to provide upgraded facilities as lakhs of visitors are expected, along with a host of politicians.
The organising committee members said the whole 14-km stretch would be flood-lit with "attractive display of lighting".
The main dais will be 120 feet long, 80 feet high and 75 feet wide with the Kanshi Ram Memorial in Lucknow as the backdrop, flanked by pillars with Buddhist motifs, according to Devi Singh Azad, a senior member of the committee.
The state culture department, Uttar Pradesh Tourism and the Information and Public Relations department would arrange for artistes and programmes.
Organising committee members are upbeat as Chief Minister Mayawati is expected to announce a package of special developmental schemes for this Taj Mahal city, gearing up for the Commonwealth Games rush.
Dalits constitute more than one-third of the 20 lakh plus population of Agra, described often as the Dalit capital of north India.
"The city was a favourite of both B.R. Ambedkar and (Bahujan Samaj Party founder) Kanshi Ram," Dalit activist Netra Pal Singh said.
The Hindu
Karunanidhi for law to accord SC status to Dalit Christians
http://www.hindu.com/2010/04/03/stories/2010040365500900.htm
Special Correspondent
He cites paragraph 3 of the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Modification Order
CHENNAI: Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi on Friday urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to enact a law for according the status of Scheduled Castes to those SCs who converted to Christianity.
Citing paragraph 3 of the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Modification Order which stated that no person who belonged to religions other than Hinduism or Sikhism or Buddhism would be considered a member of the SCs, Mr. Karunanidhi, in a letter, called for the deletion of the paragraph.
The State government was of the view that members of the castes listed in the Schedule (Scheduled Castes) had suffered social and economic discrimination, irrespective of the religion professed by them. His government was committed to extending all concessions, meant for SCs, to members of the SCs who were following other religions.
Mr. Karunanidhi drew Dr. Singh's attention to the fact that the State government had already urged the Union government to take steps in this regard.
Out Look India
The One Rival
http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?264927
The UP CM has no answer for the Congress scion
Uttar Pradesh chief minister and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati likes to come across as someone arrogant, unfazed and indifferent to her critics, dismissive of her opponents. There is one rival, though, who gives her discomfiture. While it is easy for her to lambast most of her adversaries, she seems to be at her wit's end when it comes to Rahul Gandhi, whom she calls the "Congress yuvraj".
Evidently, she is aware that while the likes of Mulayam Singh Yadav do not have the political tools or the charisma to dent her party's Dalit votebank, the Congress scion is surely endowed with that potential. According to party insiders, the manner in which Rahul reaches out to the common man, including Dalits in the remotest of villages, is extremely frustrating for Mayawati. Equally, the younger Gandhi is capable of wooing Brahmins who had backed the BSP in the 2007 elections but are now disillusioned and feel shortchanged by Mayawati.
Party sources also feel that Mayawati's obsession with personal security cover is alienating her from the people. She has made herself totally inaccessible, shutting her doors to everyone and confining herself to her official residence—4, Kalidass Marg. The traditional daily morning janata durbar, where most visitors were wronged Dalits, has virtually disappeared. She allows access only to a select few. Even her own party legislators and MPs find it difficult to meet her. Harassed and harried Dalits, attempting to get anywhere close to the CM's residence in search of justice, have only landed themselves behind bars on the charge of "violating the CM's security".
Mayawati rarely sits in her office. No one has a convincing answer for this. "You must remember that besides looking after the affairs of the state, she also has to handle her party, which she runs single-handedly at the national level," her close confidant and BSP state chief and cooperatives minister Swami Prasad Maurya says in her defence. "Remember, she is the national president of the party, and also has to attend to organisational matters of different states."
Maurya is in no mood to entertain any comparison with Rahul vis-a-vis his accessibility to people. "How can you compare Behenji with the 'Congress yuvraj'? She has gone through the mill to make her way up to this level. She has earned respect and commands it while Rahul was born with a silver spoon and has been thrust upon others."
Notwithstanding his claims or of other sycophants, her feudal ways are undeniably slowly alienating Mayawati from her roots. And it is none other than Rahul who appears to be making a dent in her hitherto exclusive Dalit bastion.
The Rahul effect is confined not just to Amethi. He has been reaching out to Dalits in the BSP stronghold of Bundelkhand, he has visited villages in different parts of the state and has gone without too much security, though he enjoys SPG cover. All this has left Mayawati jittery. In the last two years, this frustration has manifested itself in the form of outbursts against the Congress leader, the labelling of his visits as a "gimmick".
Very clearly, Mayawati does not know how to handle the problem called Rahul. Had it been bete noire Mulayam Singh levelling wild allegations against her, she would have had no trouble paying him back in the same coin. But countering Rahul's offbeat and down-to-earth moves is another bugbear altogether.
--.Arun Khote
On behalf of
Dalits Media Watch Team
(An initiative of "Peoples Media Advocacy & Resource Centre-PMARC")
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Peoples Media Advocacy & Resource Centre- PMARC has been initiated with the support from group of senior journalists, social activists, academics and intellectuals from Dalit and civil society to advocate and facilitate Dalits issues in the mainstream media. To create proper & adequate space with the Dalit perspective in the mainstream media national/ International on Dalit issues is primary objective of the PMARC.
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