MediaVigil, Journal of Global Communications and Justice

I am heartened by the broad support I have received over the past fortnight. However, I am deeply concerned and very disturbed by insinuations that my complaint is part of a pre-election political conspiracy. I categorically refute such insinuations and put forward the following arguments: The struggle for women to assert control over their lives and their bodies is most certainly a political one, but feminist politics and its concerns are wider than the narrow universe of our political parties. Thus, I call upon our political parties to resist the temptation to turn a very important discussion about gender, power and violence into a conversation about themselves. Suggestions that I am acting on someone else’s behest are only the latest depressing indications that sections of our public discourse are unwilling to acknowledge that women are capable to making decisions about themselves for themselves. In this past week, television commentators who should know bett...

Supreme Court does not give relief to Biometric Data Collector, Government of India for Aadhaar/UID How can collection of DNA samples and biometric data collection precede passage of Human DNA Profiling Bill, 2012 and and National Identification Authority of India Bill, 2013 Previous Orders of Supreme Court, Andhra Pradesh High Court and Punjab and Haryana High Court rules against 12 digit biometric aadhaar/unique identification (UID) NUMBER West Bengal Assembly's resolution against aadhaar/unique identification (UID) number on the horizon, action by other State Legislatures awaited   November 26, 2013, Kolkata: Supreme Court did not give relief to Biometric Data Collector, Government of India for 12 digit biometric aadhaar/unique identification (UID) NUMBER. Clearly, States which are making aadhhar in manifest contempt of Supreme Court's order dated 23 September 2013 directed, “In the meanwhile, no person should suffer for not getting the Aadhaar card in spite of the fact th...

Amongst other things, the Tarun Tejpal imbroglio highlights the incompetence or unwillingness of organisations to deal with sexual harassment cases at workplace in the letter and spirit of the Vishaka guidelines. However, the committees set up according to these guidelines should not always be conceptualised as a redressal mechanism that is “alternative” to the law. Ayesha Kidwai ( ayesha.kidwai@gmail.com ) teaches at the Centre for Linguistics, Jawaharlal Nehru University, and is a member of its internal complaints committee, GSCASH. The ongoing Tarun Tejpal sexual assault imbroglio has been revelatory at multiple levels, but perhaps most of all of the truth of Noam Chomsky's observations (in another context) that “for the powerful, crimes are those that others commit." It is far easier to demand in print columns and television studios that the definition of r...