Counterview

By Raj Kumar Sinha*   The International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples (August 9) is dedicated to protecting the rights of indigenous communities, safeguarding their heritage, and recognizing their contributions to society and the environment. It is also an occasion to reaffirm the human rights of indigenous peoples across the world and acknowledge their unique cultural identities and their vital role in protecting nature.

By A Representative  On the eve of India's 80th Independence Day, a prominent policy analyst has released a comprehensive report urging a fundamental strategic reassessment of the country's electricity sector. The proposal, submitted to the Union Ministries of Power, New and Renewable Energy, Finance, and NITI Aayog, advocates for a decisive pivot from the traditional "capacity expansion" model to a "system optimisation" paradigm centred on distributed renewable energy (DRE).

By A Representative   A group of concerned citizens, including writers, academics, filmmakers, activists and public figures, has appealed to the Chief Justice of India to intervene in the continued incarceration of activist Umar Khalid and former JNU scholar Sharjeel Imam, who have been in custody as undertrial prisoners in the 2020 Delhi riots conspiracy case. In an open letter addressed to the Chief Justice of India, the signatories expressed concern over the prolonged use of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), arguing that extended pre-trial detention must be weighed against an accused person's fundamental right to liberty and a speedy trial. The letter recalls the Supreme Court's 2021 judgment in K.A. Najeeb, in which the court held that constitutional courts retain the power to grant bail even under stringent UAPA provisions when prolonged incarceration infringes an accused person's right to a speedy trial under Article 21. The signatories quoted the judgm...

By A Representative   A group of women advocates who stood sixth and seventh among female candidates in the recent Bar Council elections have filed a petition before the Supreme Court, seeking a recall and reconsideration of the Court’s August 4 order determining the mechanism for co-opting women into State Bar Councils.

By Ravi Ranjan*  Savita Singh's poem "No Enemy" (Satru Nahin) represents a distinctive intervention in contemporary Hindi poetry, weaving together feminist consciousness and ecological ethics into a unified vision. The poem transcends conventional nature poetry by imagining relationships among human beings, rivers, trees, birds, forests, and silence founded upon mutual respect rather than dominion. At a historical moment when feminist and environmental discourses converge, Singh's work demonstrates that the liberation of women and nature cannot be understood independently of one another.

By Harsh Thakor*  Ghassan Kanafani, who was assassinated in Beirut in 1972, was not just a master of Palestinian literature, a pioneering journalist, and a visionary strategist, but was also a diehard internationalist. He comprehensively understood that the struggle against Zionism and imperialism in Palestine intersected with the anti-colonial, Pan-African liberation movements cutting across the African continent.