Tag Archives: Country: India

The Hindu: “After Canada-based Research in Motion (RIM), makers of Blackberry, fell in line with the government demands of granting lawful access to its encrypted messages, the government is all set to issue notices to search engine Google, internet phone call provider Skype, Virtual Private Network (VPN) service providers and a few other entities to make available their services to law enforcement agencies.”

Asia News: “A former Hindu converted to Christianity was killed this morning near Tiangia, a village in the district of Kandhamal (Orissa) hit by anti-Christian pogrom of August 2008.”

CatholicCulture.org: “Archbishop Raphael Cheenath of Cuttack Bhubaneswar— whose archdiocese includes the troubled Kandhamal region that saw orchestrated mob violence against Christians two years ago—has issued a scathing denunciation of the law that restricts religious conversions in the eastern state of Orissa.”

Daily News and Analysis: “The Karnataka high court on Tuesday sought to know the state and central governments’ stand on a petition filed by 70-year-old HB Karibasamma who had knocked on the doors of the court seeking mercy-killing or euthanasia.”

Associated Press: “Some questions and answers about foreign countries planning to ban the use of BlackBerry’s messaging and Web services: Q: Which countries are involved? A: India, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have threatened to shut down some BlackBerry services in their respective countries. Lebanon and Indonesia have said they’re considering similar moves, but have no firm plans.”

Reuters: “Indian demands are giving a new headache to BlackBerry maker Research in Motion after New Delhi threatened a shutdown that could affect one million of the smartphone’s 41 million users.”

Catholic Culture: “In yet another shocking example of the deep-rooted cultural prejudice against female children in India, a young mother who gave birth to a second girl child was murdered by her husband.”

Christian Today: “A church council fighting for the rights of Dalit Christians in India has called on churches and Christian organisations to observe August 10 as ‘Black Day.’ It was on August 10, 1950, that a presidential Order prevented ‘low-caste’ Christians from enjoying the economic and educational benefits authorised by the government for those of the Hindu faith.”

Indian Express: “According to Deputy Commissioner Rahul Tiwari, Ludhiana has nearly 397 religious encroachments and the Administration is all set to deal with the menace.”

Guardian: “The Confederation of Indian Industry predicts [surrogacy] will generate $2.3bn (£1.5bn) annually by 2012. A recent report by the Indian Law Commission described it as a ‘pot of gold’. Radical legislation is to be introduced to bring some order to this booming but almost unregulated sector.”

The Christian Post: “Two evangelists said they survived an attack in Balaghat district, Madhya Pradesh, by playing dead last week when suspected Hindu extremists surrounded them and severely beat them. The six assailants accused Mahindra Kharoley, 20, and 30-year-old Munshi Prasaad Bahey of ‘forced conversion.’”

AFP: “Heavy use of ‘morning-after’ pills is causing concern in India where the government has banned ads criticised for promoting them as a primary contraceptive rather than an emergency measure.”

Washington Post: “A group of nations — including the United States, China and Russia — have for the first time signaled a willingness to engage in reducing the threat of attacks on each others’ computer networks. Although the agreement, reached this week at the United Nations, is only recommendations, Robert K. Knake, a cyberwarfare expert with the Council on Foreign Relations, said it represents a ‘significant change in U.S posture’ and is part of the Obama administration’s strategy of diplomatic engagement.”

Spero News: “Muslims in Kerala state, India, say they will intensify their protest against a Catholic school that refuses to allow girls wearing headscarves to attend classes. It is ‘our fundamental right to practice our religion,’ said Abdul Jabbar, district secretary of the Popular Front of India, a confederation of Muslim organizations.”

Mangalorean: “Member of the samiti Ravindra Kamath told presspersons here on Wednesday that State governments had taken over management of major Hindu temples such as Sri Siddhivinayak temple in Mumbai, Sai Baba Mandir in Shirdi and Sri Vithal temple in Pandharpur in Maharashtra. The temples at Sabarimala and Guruvayur had been brought under the Devaswom boards in Kerala. Even the temple at Tirumala was under the control of the Endowment Department of Andhra Pradesh.”

Spero News: “A group of unknown assailants severed the hand and the right arm of a university professor accused of defaming Mohammed months ago. The execution took place yesterday morning in Muvattupuzha, Ernakulam district (Kerala). Sajan K George, president of the Global Council of Indian Christians condemns this “barbaric act” and recalls that ‘Sharia is not the law of India.’”

The Financial Express: “A division Bench of Chief Justice J N Patel and Justice B Bhattacharjee hearing a PIL held that there was no provision for reservation [of housing built by a government agency according to religious affiliation] in the Constitution.”

Times of India: “Two graves in a Roman Catholic cemetery at Goa Velha were vandalised, prompting the police to register a case of hurting religious feelings against unknown persons on Friday.”

Associated Press: “Hundreds of Indian gay rights activists and their supporters celebrated the first anniversary Friday of a landmark court ruling decriminalizing homosexuality and marking their gradual acceptance in the deeply conservative country.”

Associated Press: “It is the third summer in a row that deadly protests have erupted, a symptom of the tensions permeating this Muslim-dominated Himalayan region, which has long chafed under Indian rule and is patrolled by hundreds of thousands of troops.”

“India has become a world centre for surrogate motherhood. Now the government proposes to legalise commercial surrogacy. The Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) [Regulation] Bill 2010 will allow unmarried women to act as surrogates for both couples and singles, including homosexuals. It is a radical measure in socially conservative India which could deliver big profits to the country’s aggressive IVF industry.”

Hindustan Times: “Hundreds of lawyers of the Calcutta High Court ransacked the Chief Justice’s courtroom, breaking windowpanes and preventing him from attending the court on Friday. The lawyers — all young advocates — resorted to vandalism after their demand for adequate space to sit in the court premises were not heeded.”

LifeNews: “Steven Mosher, the expert on the China one-child policy credited with exposing and bringing attention to the problem of forced abortions carried out under it, reminded the audience at the National Right to Life convention that the forced abortions on women continue. Moreover, Mosher says they are producing a male-dominated culture that is responsible for an increase in prostitution, sexual trafficking of women, and even the sale of young girls.”

Financial Times: “Over the last few years, India has emerged as a big hub for infertile Western couples seeking young women willing to serve as surrogate mothers for their babies. … Yet the largely unregulated business has generated many concerns, including worries about practices that could risk the surrogate mothers’ health. Indian is now planning a draft law to clean up an industry which has been limited only by the ethics of local doctors – many willing to go to great lengths and push the young surrogates hard – to satisfy their affluent customers’ demands.”

NDTV: “Sambhavi was proclaimed and celebrated as a child goddess. Her parents claimed she was Dalai Lama’s friend in an earlier incarnation, but the Andhra Pradesh State Human Rights Commission has ordered that the eight-year-old child from Kurnool district must go to school so her right to education is not violated. . . . ‘She knows English, French, Vedas and astrology. Merely mechanically sending the girl to a school does not mean she will be educated,’ said P Vishnuvardhan Reddy, Sambhavi’s lawyer.”

Catholic Online: “Even if peace is slowly returning to the District of Kandhamal, the State of Orissa continues to be the scene of anti-Christian violence. A young Christian was recently beaten, tortured and dragged into the middle of his village, where his tormentors forced him to undergo a ceremony of reconversion to Hinduism.”

Catholic Culture: “Police in India’s state of Orissa have arrested a Hindu extremist who was one of the men accused of raping a Catholic nun during a burst of violence in August 2008.”

The Straits Times: “India’s Hindus cremate their loved ones, but the country’s Muslim and Christian minorities usually choose burial – and they fear the practice is under threat.”

Christian Post: “Two women pastors were arrested and sent to jail on false charges by a Hindu Nationalist Movement in Karnataka, India, according to a Christian advocacy group.”

The Times of India: “With amendments on the anvil to make divorce easier for Hindus, a similar move may be underway for Sikhs. The Cabinet on Thursday cleared amendments to the Hindu Marriage Act and the Special Marriage Act, allowing the provision of ‘irretrievable breakdown of marriage’ to be included as ground for divorce.”

NewKerala.com: “The irretrievable breakdown of a marriage will be made an additional ground for divorce under an amendment to the Hindu Marriage Act and the Special Marriage Act approved by the cabinet Thursday.”

Center for Reproductive Rights: “On June 4, 2010, during the 14th session of the Human Rights Council, the United Nation’s Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health, Anand Grover, presented reports on Poland and India. The report called on both countries to improve the situation for sexual and reproductive health and rights. The Center proactively participated in the preparation of these two reports and intervened orally before the Human Rights Council in support of his recommendations . . . ”

Hindustan Times: “The fate of a French homosexual’s twins, born to a surrogate mother in Mumbai, rests with the judiciary in France. The French researcher has been stranded in Mumbai with his twins as he is facing difficulty in getting permission to take them home.”

Times of India: “Having emerged as the hottest destination for surrogacy, it is but natural for India to take the lead in evolving a law that safeguards the interests of all the parties concerned, including the child born through assisted reproductive technology (ART). There is no precedent to the proposal under consideration that foreigners or NRIs seeking to rent a womb in India be made to give evidence that their country of residence recognized surrogacy and would give citizenship to a child born through agreement.”

ADF Attorney Erik Stanley writing at Speak Up Movement / Church: “I had the distinct pleasure to recently hear Dr. Ajai Lall from Central India Christian Mission speak. Dr. Lall started CICM many years ago as a church-planting and evangelistic outreach to India and the surrounding countries. His mission has been to spread the Gospel of Christ throughout India and, through God’s blessings, CICM has been wildly successful . . . Let Emmanuel’s story stand not just as an amazing page in church history, but let it stand as a witness to all Americans not to take religious freedom for granted. Let us exercise the religious freedom we do have and thank God that we live in a country where we don’t have to fear death or physical harm for holding and sharing our faith.”

CrossWalk: “Hindu nationalist organizations in Madhya Pradesh state have declared their intentions to rid Mandla district of all Christian influence by starting preparations for a large ‘reconversion’ event next year.”

Business Week: “Almost half of these deaths occurred in just five countries — China, Nigeria, India, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Pakistan. Africa (4.2 million) and Southeast Asia (2.39 million) accounted for the highest numbers of deaths . . . “

“There are more than 1000 IVF clinics in India, but no laws govern assisted reproductive technology (ART), which includes surrogacy, and no watchdog has been authorised to police it. ‘Most of the ART clinics in this country are not following these guidelines because they do not have any legal strength,’ said R. S. Sharma, the deputy director-general in the division of reproductive health and nutrition at the Indian Council of Medical Research.” | Via Wesley J. Smith | For more on surrogacy in India, see this ADF Alliance Alert compound tag: http://www.alliancealert.org/tag/country-india+topic-surrogacy/

Sakaal Times: “The All India Christian Council on Friday demanded that in the Census 2010 format, provision should be made for religious monorities – as the same has been done for respective castes.”

The Christian Institute: “British Indian women are going abroad to abort their baby girls because of pressure on them to have boys, a journalist has warned. Kishwar Desai pointed to statistics from the University of Oxford which estimate almost 100 baby girls are ‘disappearing’ from British Indian families every year.”

Spero News: “A gang of Hindu extremists affiliated with the Bajrang Dal attacked a group of Christian women and children who were coming from a peace festival. The incident occurred last night around 11.30 in a village in the State of Karnataka. During the attack, the Hindu extremists called in police who instead of stopping the attackers arrested the women and children. The latter were kept in jail overnight and released only this morning at 8.30. Christian activists slammed this latest example of anti-Christian discrimination and violence, which represents further evidence of the progressive ‘talibanisation’ of India.”

William Dalrymple writing in The National Interest: “Much has now been written about the way that India is moving forward to return the subcontinent to its traditional place at the heart of global trade, but so far little has been said about the way these huge earthquakes have affected the diverse religious traditions of South Asia. For they, much like India, are rapidly changing as the region reinvents itself . . . The tensions come not only from the fractures inherent in globalization. Modernization within India is also destroying the local and varied flavors of Hinduism, swiftly turning it into a single—ofttimes politicized—religion.”

BBC: “Authorities in the western Indian state of Gujarat say they have recovered more than a dozen human foetuses from a rubbish bin in the city of Ahmedabad.”

Spero News: “Christians in a central Indian tribal belt expressed relief after churches and pastors were given police protection. Balaghat district in Madhya Pradesh faced trouble after police resisted attempts by some rightwing Hindu groups to storm the concluding function of a Christian program on April 15.”

Religion Clause Blog: “In the Indian state of Kerala, a 2-judge bench of the High Court held that neither the state nor any of its instrumentalities may be involved with the creation of an Islamic banking institution . . . ”

The Peninsula: “Kerala High Court has ruled that neither the state government nor its agencies should invest in an Islamic financial institution. In their interim order on a petition filed by Janata Party chairman Subrmaniam Swamy, Chief Justice J Chelemeswar and Justice C N Ramachandran Nair asked the state government not to fund any venture that went against the secular ethos of the Constitution.”

DNA: “The Bombay high court today said there was a need for special prison guidelines for transgenders. Court made the observation while dealing with the bail application of a transgender prisoner, who also complained about ‘unfriendly’ attitude of other inmates of the prison. Prashant (name changed), a transgender, in his bail application alleged that though he was being kept in the male ward of central prison, Nasik, other prisoners avoided him.”

Christian Post: “Minority Christians in southern Karnataka state are under an unprecedented wave of Christian persecution, having faced more than 1,000 attacks in 500 days, according to an independent investigation by a former judge of the Karnataka High Court.”

SIFY News: “A bench of Justice G.S. Singhvi and Justice Asok Kumar Ganguly gave the government more time as it failed to submit an affidavit stating its stand on the issue. German national John Balaz and his wife had pleaded that they were willing to adopt the twins in India itself as birth through a surrogate mother was illegal in their country. To this, government counsel indicated willingness to consider relaxing the country’s adoption norms for the German couple.”

One India: “Transgender persons in West Bengal want reservation not just in Parliament, but also in education, jobs and all community and social development programmes. Transgender activist, Agniva Lahiri points out that mere political representation cannot bring emancipation to a community which is fighting for its right to citizenship and human rights in India.”

Montreal Gazette: “Commercial surrogacy is a booming industry in India, and in recent years the ranks of childless foreign couples have been swelled by gay partners looking for a low-cost, legally-friendly path to parenthood.”

Christian Science Monitor: “Gender selection via abortion appears to be on the rise in India – and more common among the wealthy. India’s upper classes tend to have fewer children and more access to ultrasounds that reveal their babies’ sex. The gender imbalance means fewer women available to be wives.”

Killed, aborted or neglected, at least 100m girls have disappeared—and the number is rising . . .

Times of India: “Morning-after pills should be back on air. And not just private companies but even the Union health ministry should advertise them. This is the view of a four-member expert committee set up by the Drug Technical Advisory Board (DTAB) recently to assess the pros and cons of allowing advertising of emergency pills.”

Education News: “The Home School Legal Defense Association and members of the Alliance Defense Fund have been advising Christer and Annie Johansson on the ‘state-napping’ of their son, Dominic, 7, from an airliner as the family was preparing to move to India last year.”

WorldNetDaily: “The Home School Legal Defense Association and members of the Alliance Defense Fund have been advising Christer and Annie Johansson on the ‘state-napping’ of their son, Dominic, 7, from an airliner as the family was preparing to move to India last year’ . . . ‘What you have here is a socialist country trying to create a cookie cutter kid,’ said Roger Kiska, an Alliance Defense Fund attorney based in Europe. ‘This kind of thing happens too often where social workers take a child and then just keep him.’”

Religion Clause Blog: “In India last week, Kerala’s High Court struck down as unconstitutional a provision that requires Christians to wait at least two years after they are first married to file for divorce.”

Christian Today: “Two churches have been burnt to the ground and Christians attacked after tension erupted on Saturday over the publication of an offensive poster of Jesus Christ in an in Batala, Punjab, in India.”

AFP: “A landmark court ruling that decriminalised gay sex between consenting adults in the Indian capital Delhi is facing fresh opposition with new groups joining religious leaders, a lawyer said Sunday.”

Josh Goodman, Divine Judgment: Judicial Review of Religious Legal Systems in India and Israel (Summer 2009). Hastings International and Comparative Law Review, Vol. 32, No. 2, p. 379. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1551608

“his paper analyzes and compares how two democratic states, India and Israel, incorporate discrete areas of religious law into their secular legal systems. As religion has become an increasingly important political force in India and Israel, both countries have turned to constitutionalism and to civil courts to manage the role of religious law within the democratic system. This development represents the convergence of two global trends: an expansion in the power of courts and the growth of religious politics. This paper examines how the conflict of secular and religious legal norms has played out in the Israeli and Indian civil courts, and draws out lessons from these countries’ experiences with religious legal pluralism.”

Malathy Iyer writing in the Times of India: Dr Anjali Malpani, an infertility specialist who treated Bohanon, now performs about three to four embryo adoptions a month as opposed to the random annual procedure, which was the case until a few years back. Says Dr Malpani, ‘With availability of better infertility treatment techniques, embryo adoption/donation is becoming popular of late across the world.’ In the US alone, where embryo adoption is about a decade old, over 1,000 babies have been born using this method.

DNA: “Gujarat High Court has observed that the state government is accountable for renovation of religious structures damaged in communal riots. The court has also said that the government is also accountable for giving compensation to such structures.”

Outlook India: “Islam or any other religion can be criticised, but a malicious criticism aimed at promoting communal hatred and painting the whole community as villainous is not permissible, Bombay High Court held today.”

Religion Clause Blog: “In India, by a vote of 5-2 the High Court of Andhra Pradesh has held that the Andhra Pradesh Reservation in Favor of socially and Educational Backward Classes of Muslims Act 2007 is unconstitutional.”

Religion Clause Blog: “According to today’s New Delhi Pioneer, a two-judge panel of the Supreme Court of India last week held that civil service rules of the state of Rajasthan barring any state employee from taking a second wife without permission of the state takes precedence over the Muslim Personal Law that allows Muslim men to have a second wife.”

Times of India: “As high drama is being played out in Indian courts over surrogacy issues, the US consulate in Chennai, perhaps worried about the rash of litigations, has decided to tighten its visa processing norms, particularly for couples coming to the city for fertility treatment and assisted reproduction.”

Christian Today: “Authorities in India’s Orissa state are reportedly forcing Christian refugees out of the makeshift camps ahead of a visit this month by an EU delegation . . . The camps’ residents – Christians caught up in attacks in 2008 – say they are being forced to move out so that the authorities can project an image of peace in the area, reports Bosnewslife agency.”

Indian Express: “The surrogate twins [born in India] of a German couple continue to be in no-man’s land . . . Subramanium told the apex court that the German embassy had said its laws were firm that surrogacy was a punishable offence, leaving little room for the children to be granted visas as German citizens.

Religion Clause Blog: “India’s Supreme Court yesterday dismissed a lawsuit asking it to order the government to amend India’s Constitution to eliminate a provision in Explanation II to Article 25 that says the reference in the Constitution to the power to legislate regarding Hindu religious institutions should be construed to also include Sikh, Jain and Buddhist institutions.”

Citizen Link: “Australia, India and China are moving to filter illegal pornography based on its harm to society. Compulsory internet filtering in Australia, the blocking of 13,000 porn sites in China and a tightening of filters in India have family advocates wondering why the U.S. isn’t following suit . . .”

Religion Clause Blog: “Janata Party leader Dr. Subramanian Swamy’s . . . complaint argues that government participation in compliance with Shariah amounts to the State Government favoring a particular religion in violation of Articles 14 and 25 of the Indian Constitution.”

UCANNews.com: “An attack on a Christmas fair in Madhya Pradesh has spread panic among Christians in the state, says an organizer of the event. Thugs chanting Hindu slogans torched representations of biblical scenes at the fair in the town of Gwalior on Dec. 20 . . . ”

Religion Clause Blog: “Currently Scheduled Caste status is available only to Hindus, Buddhists and Sikhs. The report also calls for continuing Scheduled Caste status for Dalits who convert from Hinudism to other religions.”

Law.com: “One of India’s highest courts has banned foreign law firms from all forms of practice in India, a major victory for a trade group of Indian lawyers and a defeat for firms that opened liaison offices in India during a brief window in the 1990s, according to the blog Legally India.”

Christian Today: “Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was last week urged to oppose the decriminalizing of homosexuality in India.”