Minister from Hindu nationalist BJP says schools should be producing Muslim professional workers, rather than future imams
An Indian state ruled by Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist party has passed a law converting state-run Islamic schools into regular schools, saying they provided sub-standard education.
Opposition politicians criticised the move and said it reflected the government’s anti-Muslim attitude in the Hindu-majority country.
Continue reading...Germany says infectious variant has been present since November; Spain sets up Covid vaccine register
India has found six cases of a more infectious variant of the coronavirus in people arriving from Britain, while South Africa reimposed a ban on alcohol sales and ordered the closure of all bars as it battles a resurgence of the virus, including another new variant.
All six of the infected people in India are in isolation and their fellow travellers are being traced, the health ministry said.
Continue reading...Highly unusual independent inquiry accuses officer of staging their deaths as a fake gunfight
In a highly unusual move, Indian police have indicted an Indian army officer, accusing him of killing three civilians in Kashmir in July and staging their deaths as a fake gunfight.
The rare independent police inquiry into extrajudicial killings in the troubled region found that the Indian military officer Capt Bhoopendra Singh, who used the alias Maj Basheer Khan, had conspired with two of his informers to abduct three local labourers. It said they killed the men, planted illegal weapons on the bodies and branded them “hardcore terrorists”.
Continue reading...Kerala villagers are reaping the benefits of a scheme that pays them to leave their trees rooted, reducing risk of deforestation
In the misty, hilly terrain of Wayanad, in the southern Indian state of Kerala, the people with any access to land in the quiet town of Meenangadi have been out counting their trees.
Sheeja CG, a 46-year-old farmer, has lived among coffee, coconut and pepper plantations all her life but last month she increased her income dramatically by mortgaging 53 of her trees at the local bank, in return for a sum of 2,650 rupees (£26.96), or 50 rupees each. She was one of the first beneficiaries of the state-sponsored scheme.
Continue reading...The notorious murderer who preyed on 70s backpackers is the subject of a new BBC drama. Our writer recalls his bizarre meetings with a charmer and psychopath
At the beginning of The Serpent, the new BBC drama series based on the exploits of a real-life serial killer, a title page declares: “In 1997 an American TV crew tracked Charles Sobhraj down to Paris where he was living as a free man.”
The ABC team were not the only ones back then to speak to Sobhraj, who was suspected of committing at least 12 murders. I too made the journey to Paris and managed to arrange an interview for the Observer with the Vietnamese-Indian Frenchman. He had just been released from jail in India, where he had spent 20 years on various charges (but not for any of the murders for which he was alleged to be responsible).
Continue reading...Dhawan casts his son Varun in the role made famous in 1995 by Govinda, but little effort has been made to acknowledge the quarter-century since
It’s a tale of two Bollywoods this Christmas. Over at Netflix, Anurag Kashyap and Vikramaditya Motwane, representing Indian film’s modernising wing, have engineered the sharp and knowing meta-thriller AK vs AK. Here on Amazon Prime Video meanwhile, you can watch veteran comedy director David Dhawan renew his IP rights on Coolie No 1, previously a hit 1995 vehicle for the Sandwell-born funnyman Govinda. Even the latter’s most devout fans would probably concede the original left room for improvements, but that’s something Dhawan appears unfussed about. This Coolie updates a few reference points and replaces Govinda with latter-day hunk Varun Dhawan – the director’s son – then surrounds him with antiquated players and playing, part of a frenetic attempt to pretend the last 30 years never happened.
The plot – lowly railway porter (Dhawan) is hired to woo a society belle (Sara Ali Khan) as part of a conspiracy to disgrace her family – remains familiar and predictable. The most immediate contrast with the original is a result of the casting. Rather too obviously a handsome, cardio-trained leading man schlubbing down for (not many) easy laughs, Dhawan Jr bounds onscreen with boyish enthusiasm, but trails a lingering note of condescension – and Dhawan Sr was evidently too busy remembering how best to smash his supporting actors in the gonads to direct anyone. Khan, sadly, is stranded on balconies looking fetchingly concerned while the men below determine her character’s destiny. In this, Coolie 2020 really does seem so last century.
Continue reading...Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, a suspect in US journalist’s 2002 killing, had conviction overturned this year
A court in Pakistan has ordered that a British-born Islamist militant charged with the 2002 kidnapping and murder of the Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl should be freed, his defence lawyer has said.
Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh was sentenced to death in 2002 for masterminding Pearl’s murder but the conviction was overturned this year. He has been in jail ever since awaiting the outcome of a series of appeals and legal arguments.
Continue reading...Saba Sahar, who returned fire while protecting her daughter, survived one of a wave of recent assassination attempts that have killed six policewomen
It was just after 7am when the car carrying Colonel Saba Sahar, one of Afghanistan’s most senior female police officers, came under fire from armed insurgents. In the back seat, Sahar’s four-year-old daughter began screaming as bullets shattered the windscreen and ripped into the upholstery. As she pushed her child under the seat in front of her, Sahar saw three men carrying AK-47 assault rifles, firing as they approached the car.
In the front of the car her bodyguard and driver had both been hit and were badly injured and unconscious. Looking down, Sahar saw blood seeping through her clothing. “It took me another moment to realise I’d been shot too,” she says. She knew that she only had minutes to try to save her daughter. “They were five or six metres away, and they were moving closer to the car, still firing. They would have killed my child,” she says. Bleeding heavily from five shots to her stomach, Sahar reached forward, grabbed the gun from her slumped bodyguard and started returning fire.
Continue reading...Exposure to the heavy metal from spice powders and car batteries is affecting child health across the subcontinent
An outbreak of a mystery illness over two days in early December in the south Indian city of Eluru saw more than 560 people hospitalised, most of them children, and baffled doctors. Symptoms were described as being similar to epilepsy, with convulsions and vomiting accompanied by burning eyes and loss of consciousness.
Recovery tended to be quick although the death of one man was attributed to the illness. In the midst of the Covid pandemic theories circulated that it was caused by too much disinfectant or vegetables washed in chlorine. Local traders saw sales slump.
Continue reading...Ofcom imposes £20,000 penalty on Republic TV for ‘highly pejorative’ comments on talk show
A rightwing Indian news channel known for its strong pro-government stance and firebrand host has been fined by the UK regulator Ofcom for broadcasting hate speech about Pakistan.
Republic TV was fined £20,000 for airing a segment on its UK service, which conveyed the view that all Pakistani people are terrorists, including “their scientists, doctors, their leaders, politicians […] Even their sports people”.
Continue reading...Fashion designer’s scheme provides secondhand shoes, clothes and jewellery free to women who can’t pay for their big day
A section of a boutique in Pappinisseri town in Kerala’s Kannur district brims over with colourful bridal lehengas, saris, gowns and shiny salwar suits.
An exuberance of fabrics adorns mannequins that stand next to tables spread with sparkly sandals, shoes, bangles and beaded bags. Tableware, bedlinen and miscellaneous items are scattered in other spaces.
Continue reading...Pakistani workers describe trying to survive on the less than £50 a month many of them earn making items for firms such as Boohoo
When Qasim Ahmed* arrived in Faisalabad a year ago, he didn’t want much – just enough money to pay for a roof over his head, buy food and send a little cash home each month.
Today, that seems like a fantasy. Instead of having enough to get by, he claims, he has found himself struggling to survive, frequently going hungry, feeling abused by his boss and fearing he is working in a factory that could go up in flames. “It makes me sad that I can’t help my parents and siblings the way I hoped before coming here,” he says.
Continue reading...Guardian investigation finds claims of safety issues, with workers saying they sometimes work 24-hour shifts
The fast fashion brand Boohoo is selling clothes made by Pakistani factory workers who say they face appalling conditions and earn as little as 29p an hour, an investigation by the Guardian has found.
In interviews in the industrial city of Faisalabad, workers at two factories claimed they were paid 10,000PKR (£47) a month, well below the legal monthly minimum wage for unskilled labour of 17,500PKR, while making clothes to be sold by Boohoo.
Continue reading...Millions of people in Maharashtra to have neighbourhoods renamed but critics say plan means little without behavioural change
The names of neighbourhoods in the Indian state of Maharashtra based on the caste of people who have traditionally lived there are to be be changed, to reflect the country’s evolving attitudes.
In the same way Indian surnames reveal the caste to which a person belongs, neighbourhoods have acquired names based on the caste of the community that predominates.
Continue reading...Crowdfunder allows Kanwal Ahmed to keep sharing advice on sex, violence… and cooking
A social media star has been dubbed Pakistan’s Kickstarter Oprah after her groundbreaking digital talk show in which women talk about taboo issues such as marital rape, cyberbullying and femicide was saved by fans.
Filming started this week on the new series of Conversations With Kanwal, in which presenter Kanwal Ahmed, 31, sheds light on issues that are rarely talked about within families, let alone in the public arena, after fans raised more than five million rupees (around £23,000) in less than a week using the online crowdfunding platform.
Continue reading...Campaigners say the deals revealed in new report are a breach of firms’ human rights responsibilities
Human rights groups are demanding that two of Britain’s biggest banks explain why they have lent tens of millions of pounds to a technology company building a telecoms network that is part-owned and used by the Myanmar military.
HSBC and Standard Chartered have loaned $60m (£44.5m) to Vietnamese telecom giant Viettel in the last four years, a period when the Myanmar military has been accused of committing war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity. Viettel is a major investor in Mytel, a Myanmar mobile network that, since its launch in June 2018, has grown to become the second-biggest operator in the country with over 10 million users.
Continue reading...Case prompts nationwide protests and further highlights country’s endemic problem of sexual violence
Four men have been charged with the gang rape and murder of a 19-year-old Dalit woman in India, a case that prompted nationwide protests and drew a fresh spotlight on India’s endemic problem of sexual violence.
In September in Hathras, a small village in Uttar Pradesh, the 19-year-old woman was working in the fields when she was pounced on by four older men who dragged her to a field, attacked her and then tried to strangle her with her shawl.
Continue reading...Over the decades many of the city’s stone markers have been submerged in concrete, but a plan is underway to restore them
Buried for years under Mumbai’s new roads and ever-increasing layers of development, the British passion for cartography is set to rise up on the city’s streets again thanks to a project to preserve its colonial milestones.
When workers from Mumbai municipal corporation (BMC) were demolishing unauthorised buildings three years ago, they unearthed a basalt stone marker with a pyramidal top and a Roman numeral on it – a British milestone and one of 16 laid out in the early 19th century on the road between Horniman Circle and Sion, then the city’s outer limit.
Continue reading...Women from the mountains of Uttarakhand in India have been guaranteed palanquins so that they can reach vital transport
Narendra Kumar is going to become a father in early January. His wife, Kavita, became pregnant two months after they got married in February and since then he has been worrying about getting her to hospital when the time comes.
It’s a steep three-kilometre walk along a narrow, unpaved mountain path through oak and rhododendron forests from their village of Gwalakot to the main road where they could pick up a car or ambulance to ferry them to hospital in Nainital.
Continue reading...Tens of thousands of protesting Indian farmers are camping along at least five major highways on the outskirts of New Delhi and have said they won’t leave until the government rolls back new laws on agricultural reform that they say will drive down crop prices and devastate their earnings
Continue reading...