Slavery still exists, but now it applies only to women and its name is prostitution!!!

Around 10 girls, including four minors have been rescued from House number 58 in Delhi’s red light area, GB Road. The girls hailing from West Bengal and Bihar were reported missing for about 10 days ago.

Acting on a tip off, the Kamla Market Police had raided the house and rescued the girls who were kept hidden as prisoners in a storeroom.

It is reported that one of the victim had reached to SHO of Kamla Market, Pramod Joshi and told him about how the girls were duped to come to Delhi with promise to provide them work. The victim joined by two other girls informed that more girls were hidden in the storeroom.

Meanwhile, the abducted girls were also forced into prostitution.

Rape is not a dirty secret, it is a violent crime

It is troubling enough that such a small proportion of reported rapes make it to court, worse still that so few victims come forward in the first place. But most disturbing of all is the reason why so many people keep their suffering to themselves: because they do not think they will be believed. That rape is still a dirty secret, hedged about with so much blame and shame that victims feel they cannot come forward, is testament to how far we still have to go.

There are, of course, great legal difficulties in rape trials. Sexual assault is one of the few crimes where proof lies not in the physical facts of the matter, but in the subjective intentions of those involved. One person's word against another's, with no corroborating witnesses, is highly problematic for a legal system predicated on the concepts of innocent until proven guilty and proof beyond reasonable doubt.

This is no call for the wholesale abandonment of basic tenets of justice. But simply to shrug our collective shoulders, blame intractable issues of principle, and thereby leave a swathe of victims of violent assault with insufficient legal protection cannot be acceptable in what purports to be a civilised society.

In fairness, there has been significant progress in terms of institutional procedures. In many areas of the country, for example, there are now specially trained police officers and court prosecutors for cases of sexual assault. But uneven regional conviction rates only underline the extent to which such practices remain an optional extra rather than standard.

Equally, although victims no longer face the prospect of being cross-questioned by their attacker in court, pursuing a case to trial remains a horrifying ordeal. As a witness for the prosecution, the victim has no legal support, and faces intensely personal questioning from defence lawyers, often while face-to-face with their rapist for the first time since the assault. Even within the framework of innocent until proven guilty, there is more that can be done to ease the burden on victims, not least allowing them legal representation in court.

But the shortcomings of our institutions are merely part and parcel of a wider cultural understanding of rape that still militates against justice. It is that culture that must change if victims are to be encouraged to speak up. Comments from the Justice Secretary last year that appeared to imply that some rapes are more "serious" than others have hardly helped, adding to the persistent fallacy – often stoked by the media – that a person being either drunk or dressed in a certain way must take some responsibility for the actions of their attacker.

Part of the problem is the myth that rape is primarily a threat on the streets at night. Far from it. In fact, rape rarely occurs in the proverbial dark alley. The truth is both more banal, and more appalling: two-thirds of victims know their attacker, and assaults commonly take place in the home of either the victim or the rapist. Perpetrators rely on shame to keep their crime secret. Too often they are proved right. And if the conspiracy of silence is a problem for women who are raped, it is even worse for men.

Rape is one of the more appalling things that one human being can do to another, and yet there is no other crime about which our society is so ambivalent. That must change.

OOPS!!! It’s time to pack up!

I am an Indian. I have every right on earth to have my own doubts and queries in this democratic country. I don’t believe the PM is a corrupt man as Team Anna claims. But like most Indians I think he is past his expiry date. His critics were saying so. Now his defenders are saying the same thing. It seems, there is nothing more that he can contribute to our political discourse.  It’s best for the nation that someone more capable steps in who can control the corrupt ministers from dipping into public funds for personal gain.

Our “respected” PM suffers from Willful Blindness. He sees what’s happening around him and pretends to be unaware of it all. Point out a wrongdoing to him and his first reaction is to look away. He is convicted that what he does not see, does not exist. It can be CRIME or CORRUPTION, INJUSTICE or HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATION, he can just ignore anything by just shutting his eyes.

While this attitude may be good for his head and soul, I am sure it does NO good to the nation. The opposition is no good either. I don’t grudge anyone!!! All I ask is for better people in the government who can take India ahead. Wasting time with minor policy changes can achieve NOTHING. What we need is more definitive action and zero tolerance towards crooks.

The PM visualizes himself as a Super Finance Minister and THAT IS IT! He is neither interested in Science nor Technology. Arts and culture seems to be things he knows not of. He has never involved himself in Education or Medicare. Justice and Human Rights don’t matter to him. Nor do issues of Environment or Public Health. In short, none of the real issues matter to him. So people with actual problems have stopped approaching him.

The joke is that the one area where Singh is focused is where everything’s going wrong. One stupid decision after another has killed the economy. Foreign investors have fled because of a series of incredibly foolish steps taken within a short span that have driven the rupee down from Rs 44 to the $ to Rs 56. Not only have foreign investors fled, even Indian businessmen are relocating since no one feels secure in an environment where the Government and its agencies can harass anyone they want on the flimsiest grounds. B raping the rupee they have also destroyed our savings, reduced our wages and raised inflation to scary heights.

And what is being done to correct this? Fuel prices are raised every few months. There are talks about more taxes. WE who were once claiming to be a Super Power are on the verge of becoming Super POOR.

By trying to control social media and ban everything in sight, from cartoons in text books to films, music, art, books, public performance, internet sites the Government is damaging the country’s credibility every day.

Is this the LEGECY, what do Manmohan Singh wants to leave behind? An economy in coma, a harassed citizenry, the media under siege, our savings gone, and India’s fabulous growth story now a distant memory.

Call a Northeastern “Chinki”, be jailed for five years

Next time you call a person from Northeast a ‘chinky’ and you could end up behind the bars for five years.

How many times have you heard someone call a person from the North East 'chinki'? How many times have you called someone from the North East 'chinki'? Now is the time to watch your tongue before you stereotype someone, because calling someone 'chinki' can land you in jail for up to five years. The term, even though derogatory, has become synonymous with people from North East because of their mongoloid features.

But in an attempt to prevent racial discrimination against people from the North East, the Ministry of Home Affairs has asked all the states and union territories to book anyone who commits an act of atrocity against people from the region under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Act.
Cyberspace has already started debating the pros and cons of this law, and while some people think a rule like this was long due, some feel that five years in jail is a little extreme. I asked people from the North East residing in Delhi if they think that people should be jailed from calling them 'chinki'.

“I welcomed the decision ofthe Ministry of Home Affairs to book the racial discrimination against people from North East India under Scheduled Caste and Tribes Prevention of Atrocity Act. It is a milestone move, a new beginning and I hope, in near future, such act will come up to protect minorities for a better and communal harmony society” said 21 years old Bhavan Meitei, a young budding journalist.

But, some of them deviated a bit.

Imprisoning people for five years is a bit too extreme. A few weeks should make the difference.- A 28 year old Radio Jockey said.

Mrs Sharma is pregnant!!! Are you Kidding me???

A beautiful woman had some trouble and went to a walk-in clinic for examination of her health. She was seen by a very handsome, young doctor.

After examining her for hardly five minutes, the doctor broke the news that she was pregnant. Immediately, the lady burst out! Screamed! And ran down the hall.

An old doctor stopped the frantic lady and inquired about her problem. After about fifteen minutes of freaking out, she told him what had happened. After listening, he had her sit and relax in another room.

He inquisitively marched down the hallway to the back where the young doctor was.

The old doctor almost screamed, “R u NUTS??? What’s wrong with you?!!! Mrs Sharma is 62 years old, has five grown up kids and twelve grand children, and you told her she was pregnant?!”

The young doctor continued to scribble something on his clipboard and did not bother to look up.

After a while, still scribbling on his clipboard, he asked, “Does she still have the HICCUPS”?