Society, Culture, Religion and History

Manual scavenging is the most obnoxious and inhuman practice violating the dignity and human personhood of safai karmacharis. It involves the engagement or employment of sections of people to manually dispose human excreta from dry latrines with bare minimum aids such as scrappers, brooms and baskets.

Manual scavenging is integrally linked with caste system and is imposed on certain dalit sub-caste groups particularly on their women. As a result all persons engaged in manual scavenging are dalits, and of them 82% are women.

7th Oct

The Birsa Munda Marga - Samajik Parivarthan Yatra, started in Dibrugarh, Assam on 7th October at 3 p.m.

From Ludhiana: Bassi Pathana Town - Fathegar sagar district:

A Community meeting was held in Valmiki Mohalla. It was attended by local eminent persons from the community, Mr. Sardar Sukhdev Singh Jamagal - rtrd Additional Judge, Mr. Kaval Jit Singh Mattu, Advocate, Mr. Dholak Ram - and President,  Safai karmachari Union, and community leader Mr. Ram ji Lal, Govt Employee. 12 liberated SK women took the responsibility of organising a meeting in the basti with the support of committee people. They invited the community as well as general public to the meeting, where the mission, demands, SKA’s back ground were discussed and people’s views were taken.

Climate Change

• Gujarat farmers fight against climate change: Adopt technology to conserve resources and maximize benefits
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• South Asia is the world's most climate-vulnerable: India ranks second

This study by CISED is a review of the rights discourse in the context of water, based on academic and popular literature on rights and civil society initiatives as well as government documents regarding water and related subjects.

I, on behalf of the local people bringing to your notice that we have a 300 years-old pond in our  locality which is known as Bhabani Pathak Dighi which is declared as a Historical and Heritage Site by the West Bengal Heritage Commission.It is in the City Centre area adjacent to the Ambuja Housing.

The total 8.48 arcs of pond and its surroundings (area not known) have been declared as a. A tunnel was found when a construction work was going on beside the pond and some renovation work has also been done there accordingly by West Bengal Heritage Commission (annexure no 13). Now the pond is only approx 3.5 arcs left and rest has been filled.

This awesome site has shot to fame by the novel Durgesnandini of great Bengali novelist Bankim Chattopadhyay.The novel describes the best featuring and intricacies of these tunnels and the pond.

Article and Image Courtesy: Asian Development Bank (ADB)

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) is launching its second video competition which is open to all aspiring filmmakers across the globe.

Saharanpur (9 Oct) :  History was created in Saharanpur once again.  Today, Paondhoi had thousands of visitors (e.g.

Blessed are those whom Almighty gives a chance to see their dreams coming true in their life time itself.   My pleasure today knows no bounds. When the idea of converting the Paondhoi river from an eye sore to the Pride of Saharanpur  had struck my mind way back in 1997,  I was hoping that may be a decade would be needed for this vision to become a reality.