“I salute this land of deras” – this is how Narendra Modi started his address to an election rally in Sirsa in the run-up to the 2014 Lok Sabha polls. And his opening sentence in another election rally in Jind during the campaign was: “I salute this land of Khaps!” There remains no doubt about the complicity of the BJP government in Haryana after the orgy of arson and violence following the August 25 conviction, by a Panchkula-based special CBI court, of Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet alias Ram Rahim for rape of his two followers.

AFTER several protests and noises over the ill-advised move to impose GST on a range of aids and appliances used by the disabled, finally the government responded and issued a press statement on July 4. What we get as a clarification is a misrepresentation of facts and an attempt to mislead the gullible.Even while the figures are disputed, the 2011 census places the count of the disabled population in the country at 2.1 per cent of the population. The vast majority of them come from poor economic backgrounds which is one of leading causes for disability.

“HUM paanch, Hamare pachees” - Narendra Modi himself mocked the Muslim community. The slogan ‘Hum do hamare do’ (we two, our two) implied a couple of wife and husband having two children. Modi meant that a Muslim man generally was having four wives, this counted to five and these five persons were having a total twenty-five children. The then chief minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi made this comment in 2002. In February of that year, we witnessed the carnage in Gujarat after Godhra incident.  The election was after few months.  In several places, he was delivering speeches at that time.

A DEPUTATION consisting of three members of the Dalit Shoshan Mukti Manch – Nathu Prasad, Surinder and Subhashini Ali (ex MP) met the National Human Rights Commission chairperson and gave him a memorandum on the brutal attack on dalit families in Shabbirpur village in Uttar Pradesh on May 5.  Members of the DSMM have been visiting the village and also the injured in the district hospital several times since May 9. The memorandum gave a detailed account of the incident and the background to it.

“There are 12 crore tribals in the country. There is a large tribal population in 170-175 districts in the country. The SECC survey of 2011 has shown that tribals are the most backward sections of society. 65 percent of tribals are landless. The income of 90 percent of tribals is less than Rs 5000 per month. Why has such a situation arisen even after 70 years of independence? This is because of the disastrous policies of successive governments, and the current BJP regime is the worst in this regard.“Tribals have lived in the jungles and mountains since generations.