Monday was Mauni Amavasya, the new moon day and most significant bathing day, particularly if it falls on a Monday. At the Hindu festival pilgrims bathe in the confluence of three sacred rivers to cleanse them of sin and liberate them from the cycle of life, death and rebirth
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The Guardian view on the pope in the Gulf: an important signal | Editorial
As the first leader of the Catholic church to visit the Arabian peninsula, Francis knows his contact with Muslims will be as important as the mass he hosts for the Christian minority
Pope Francis’s visit to the United Arab Emirates this week will be greeted enthusiastically. Some 120,000 people are expected to turn out for his mass in a sports stadium in Abu Dhabi – as many as turned out in Dublin when he travelled to historically Catholic Ireland last year. The first visit by a pontiff to the Arabian peninsula, the birthplace of Islam, highlights the complications of the religious situation in the Middle East, and more widely the issues of Christian-Muslim relations.
There may be as many as 2 million Christians in the Middle East today. Despite nearly 16 years of war and sometimes brutal persecution in the aftermath of the invasion of Iraq, many remain in the lands that were the cradle of Christianity. In part this is because it is still made as hard as possible for them to leave the region. The Christians of Iraq have largely been driven from their homes by persecution, as have some of the Christians of Syria, where a number have taken the side of the Assad dictatorship. But they have ended up in refugee camps rather than reaching notionally Christian Europe.
Continue reading...At least seven killed after train derails in Bihar, India
Coaches of Delhi-bound train leave track 30 miles from Bihar state capital, Patna
Seven passengers are reported to have been killed and several others injured when a Delhi-bound train derailed in India’s eastern state of Bihar, railways officials have said.
Eleven coaches of the Seemanchal Express left the rails near Sahadai Buzurg railway station, about 50 km (30 miles) from the state capital, Patna, early in the morning, the railways ministry said.
Continue reading...Major western brands pay Indian garment workers 11p an hour
Study reveals ‘unchecked’ exploitation of women and girls from marginalised communities
Most consumers don’t think twice about the buttons on their shirt, or the sparkles on their dress. But these finishing touches are sewn by some of the world’s most vulnerable women and girls.
A week on from revelations that women in a Bangladesh factory were paid the equivalent of 35p an hour to make Spice Girls T-Shirts sold to raise money for Comic Relief, a new report highlights the exploitative conditions facing millions of home-based garment workers in India.
Continue reading...Pioneering Bollywood lesbian romance opens in India
Film is first mainstream Indian movie to show family coming to terms with daughter being gay
A father tries to marry off his daughter to a handsome bachelor. She resists, insisting her heart lies with someone else. There is singing and dancing. It could be the trailer for any Bollywood romance.
Only the barest hint is given that Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga (How I Felt When I Saw that Girl) is a pioneering release for Indian cinema: the first mainstream, star-studded blockbuster about a family coming to terms with their daughter loving another woman.
Continue reading...Asia Bibi: Pakistan’s top court upholds blasphemy acquittal
Christian woman who spent eight years on death row free to leave country
Asia Bibi, the Christian farm labourer who spent eight years on death row in Pakistan for blasphemy, is expected to leave the country after the supreme court upheld her acquittal.
The court on Tuesday rejected a challenge to October’s ruling brought by an extreme Islamist party, which led violent protests across the country in the autumn and called for Bibi to be killed.
Continue reading...Tollywood confidential: inside the world’s biggest film city
The next 15 megacities #11: As Hyderabad heads towards megacity status, its film industry is going from strength to strength. Its secret? Cutting-edge VFX and filming in multiple languages
It is rush hour on Monday morning in Hyderabad, but the city’s usual deafening soundtrack of revving engines and blaring horns is absent. The only noise comes from a woman gently sweeping the veranda of one of the large, pastel-coloured mansions nearby. The silence is even more disconcerting when you see the airport near the end of the street, and, just beyond that, a railway station. New York’s Statue of Liberty is a short walk away, as is the splendour of the ancient city of Mahishmati. In fact, Mahishmati is the first place here where I encounter any real noise – the blue special effects screens around the fibreglass throne area are rather flimsy, and a buzz from power tools carries from the adjoining parking lot, where workers are building a pirate ship.
We are in Ramoji Film City, the largest film studio in the world and the beating heart of Tollywood, India’s Telugu-language film industry. And although Ramoji is technically part of Hyderabad, in reality – with its (real) hotels, workshops, soundstages, gardens, post office, banks and restaurants – it is a metropolis in and of itself.
Continue reading...US framework deal with Taliban raises hope of Afghan peace
US troops would withdraw from Afghanistan within 18 months of full agreement
US and Taliban officials have agreed in principle to the framework of a deal that could pave the way for peace talks in Kabul and ultimately the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan, raising hopes of a breakthrough in the country’s 17-year conflict.
Under the terms of the draft framework, the insurgents would promise to stop Afghan territory being used by terrorists. The US special envoy, Zalmay Khalilzad, confirmed the existence of the draft in an interview with the New York Times (NYT).
Continue reading...Pakistan court to hear appeal against Asia Bibi blasphemy acquittal
Supreme court to consider petition against last year’s quashing of conviction
Pakistan’s supreme court is to consider a petition on Tuesday against the acquittal of Asia Bibi, a Christian woman whose blasphemy conviction was overturned in October.
Bibi, who spent eight years on death row, has been held at a secret location since her death sentence was quashed after hardline Islamists threatened to kill her if she was freed.
Continue reading...US-Taliban talks offer glimmer of hope on path to Afghan peace
Insurgents demonstrate their commitment by naming top commander as chief negotiator
Taliban and US negotiators have reportedly agreed parts of a potential peace deal a day after the Afghan insurgents signalled their commitment to talks by naming one of their most senior commanders as chief negotiator.
News of progress in the Qatar talks, and the appointment of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, appeared to offer for the first time in nearly two decades a glimmer of real hope for a path to peace in Afghanistan.
Continue reading...India’s military elite gears up for Republic Day – in pictures
The President’s Bodyguard, a 200-strong cavalry unit, have for centuries been assigned to India’s most prominent VIPs
Continue reading...Canada: mother and uncle accused of ‘honor killing’ extradited to India
Uncle and mother, both Canadian citizens of Indian origin, accused by Indian authorities of killing daughter in 2000
Canada has extradited the mother and uncle of a woman killed 19 years ago to face justice in India for their alleged roles in her honor killing.
The body of Jaswinder Kaur Sidhu was found with her throat slit in June 2000 in Punjab state. She was 25 at the time of her death.
Continue reading...Woman who defied Indian temple ban ‘shunned’ by family
Kanakadurga, 39, allegedly beaten and ousted from home for entering Sabarimala shrine
A woman who defied violent protests to worship at a centuries-old south Indian shrine that banned females of “menstruating age” has been spurned by her family, attacked by relatives and locked out of her home.
On New Year’s Day, Kanakadurga, 39, along with Bindu Ammini, became the first women to enter the inner sanctum of Kerala state’s Sabarimala temple, one of the holiest Hindu sites in the country.
Continue reading...Tired of dark fields and jeering men: the bride who led a ‘toilet revolution’ | Amrit Dhillon
Komal Hadala’s hellish treks to relieve herself inspired a campaign that left her Indian village flushed with success
The day after her wedding, Komal Hadala was shaken awake at 4am by her mother-in-law. They joined a group of women who were waiting outside the house, in Nithora village, Uttar Pradesh.
“It was the time when they went outdoors to relieve themselves in the fields before men started appearing. I couldn’t believe it. It was total darkness outside. And it had been raining,” says Hadala.
Continue reading...Factory that supplied Tesco compensated abused worker
The woman was robbed and told if she protested she would be ‘killed and put in box’
A Bangladeshi factory that produces clothes for Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Mothercare was forced to compensate an “outspoken” female worker after she was beaten up on the orders of management and threatened with being murdered, the Guardian has learned.
The woman claimed to have been “severely beaten up” by security guards and the HR and compliance management at the factory, which is used by the brand Stanley/Stella. She said she was robbed of her severance pay and told that if she protested she would be “killed and her body put in a cardboard box”, an industry watchdog report that endorses her account states.
Continue reading...Hopefuls pay out thousands of rupees to chase Gurkha glory in Nepal | Pete Pattisson
Training academies – and unscrupulous agents – are cashing in on young men preparing for this month’s feared ‘doko race’ to secure a lucrative British army job
Long before the sun rises above the towering Himalayan peaks that overlook Pokhara in central Nepal, scores of young men gather in the dark on the edge of the town to train for the race of a lifetime.
At the starter’s signal, they charge off, first heaving a 25kg sack of sand into a “doko” wicker basket on their backs, and then starting a gruelling 5km race up the steep mountainside. Finish in less than 46 minutes and they have a chance to join the Gurkhas, the legendary brigade of the British army.
Continue reading...Taliban kill ‘more than 100 people’ in attack on Afghan military base
Attackers detonated car bomb inside complex in Maidan Wardak province, say officials
The Taliban have launched a major attack on an Afghan military compound in central Maidan Wardak province, officials have said, with some putting the death toll at more than 100 people.
Monday’s incident at a campus of the National Directorate of Security (NDS) is the latest in a series of deadly attacks in recent months by the Taliban, which has seized control of about half of Afghanistan.
Continue reading...Revealed: Spice Girls T-shirts made in factory paying staff 35p an hour
Workers producing tops sold to raise money for Comic Relief receive far below a living wage
Spice Girls T-shirts sold to raise money for Comic Relief’s “gender justice” campaign were made at a factory in Bangladesh where women earn the equivalent of 35p an hour during shifts in which they claim to be verbally abused and harassed, a Guardian investigation has found.
The charity tops, bearing the message “#IWannaBeASpiceGirl”, were produced by mostly female machinists who said they were forced to work up to 16 hours a day and called “daughters of prostitutes” by managers for not hitting targets.
Continue reading...‘Inhuman conditions’: life in factory making Spice Girls T-shirts
Staff at Bangladesh plant tell of fainting and abuse while sewing charity tops designed by group
Salma has never even heard of the Spice Girls. Her life, hunched over a sewing machine for up to 16 hours a day, is a world away from the luxuries enjoyed by the millionaire pop band.
But while neither knows it, Salma and the Spice Girls are connected. The factory where she has worked for more than five years, off a narrow, winding road three hours’ drive from Dhaka, is where charity T-shirts designed by the group were made.
Continue reading...‘I have lost my wallet and brother’: reuniting at Kumbh Mela, the world’s largest festival
As an estimated 15m Hindus gather at convergence of holy rivers in India, the huge lost-and-found centres go digital
Day and night, through crackling loudspeakers, the announcements ring out. “It is Babu speaking,” says a shrill voice. “I have lost my wallet and brother. Please come here the moment you hear this.”
“Lal Ram is here,” a woman says a few times. “Come and collect him from the yellow tower.”
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