Girls married to Gond bridegrooms in Madhya Pradesh’s Mandla district, will never ever end up as widows. According to their tradition, if a woman’s husband dies, she is married to the next bachelor in the family – regardless of age. If there are no eligible boys, the village elders (usually a woman) will present the woman with […]
New Delhi: The Indian government was severely critical of an official US government report that claimed religious freedom in India was on a “negative trajectory” in 2015 as religious tolerance had “deteriorated” and that violations of religious freedom had “increased”. The report by the US Commission on International Religious Freedom also named some top BJP […]
May begins with workers’ day followed closely by Press Freedom Day, but working journalists are anything but secure in the hinterland in India. On May 10, journalists of Chhatisgarh will be protesting in Delhi against the State sponsored intimidation and violence against them. Chhattisgarh continues to be one of the most dangerous places for journalists […]
Nepal: the latest country to join the ‘intolerant’ tags on social media? For one, they’re booting out a foreigner for criticizing their government in his tweets and social posts. Secondly, there’s no way you can appeal! A Canadian living and working in Nepal has been ordered to leave the country within two days after criticising […]
For the first time ever, a Pakistan court will hear a Sikh man’s case against Muslims for ‘blasphemy’. In this Islamic country, it’s usually the non-Muslims who are tried under this controversial law,. Five people have appeared in a Pakistani court accused of blasphemy after a Sikh man complained they had desecrated his turban during […]
Calcutta : A suspected pedophile has been arrested and remanded to judicial custody, when a 14 year old boy complained of molestation. The sessions court on Saturday (Nov 28) remanded an American citizen in custody for 14 days over allegations he molested a teenaged boy in his hotel room, police said. The 51-year-old US national […]
Patna: You don’t have a toilet in your village home? You can’t contest Panchayat elections! Nobody will be able to contest elections under the three-tier panchayati raj system in Bihar if they do not have a toilet at home. Bihar, has 1.63 crore families without access to toilets, according to the public health engineering department […]
Bihar ranks first among the states in terms of rural housing shortage (42.10 lakhs), says census data. Back in 1947, Bihar was probably the first state in the country to enact a separate law, namely the Bihar Privileged Persons Homestead Tenancy Act, for providing security of tenure to landless rural households. Since then the Bihar […]
NEW DELHI: The Madhesi agitation in Nepal may affect fruit juice drinkers in India. The Nepalese politicians living in the areas along the Indo-Nepal border have stopped the movement of vehicles along it in protest against certain provisions of the new Nepal Constitution. So goods can’t be moved from Nepal to India and vice-versa until […]
The year was 2012. Water dripping from the feet of Jesus on a crucifix in a Bombay suburb was being hailed as a ‘modern miracle’. Hundreds of feverish Catholics, including nuns and religious and other curious residents flocked to the shrine in a nondescript Mumbai suburb to watch the hypnotic drip. Some even drank the […]
For a decade, Orthodox priest Artyom Vechelkovsky taught at a religious seminary in the city of Samara. He says that his colleagues knew that he was gay, but accepted him and valued his work. But in the current climate of rising antigay sentiment in Russia, church officials suddenly decided to dismiss him, according to a […]
Sasaram: Imagine walking some 25 kilometres to vote, and carrying enough food to last you three days? Well, would you take the trouble to vote if your polling booth was 12 to 25 kilometres away? The Election Commission of India, on the recommendations of Rohtas district administration, has allowed shifting of 12 booths supposed to […]
