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In India, Sex Workers Try To Shield Girls From Suffering Their Same Fate

HYDERABAD — Sex workers in towns and villages in the southern Indian states of Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka are often married off at a young age, or trafficked to larger cities. Statistics released by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) place Andhra Pradesh second, behind West Bengal, for the prevalence of human trafficking. Many of those being trafficked are young girls, and the UN office says that in January alone, 939 minor girls were reported missing from the southeastern state. But one positive development is that a growing number of the women who have been victims of […]

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In The News

The Meaning Of Brecht In Modern-Day Mumbai

The famous playwright who fled Nazi Germany only to be hauled, years later, before the House Committee on Un-American Activities has plenty to contribute still in our post-truth world.

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In The News

Virginity Test, Why An Ugly Patriarchal Rite Won’t Go Away

In India, a centuries-old custom comes up against basic demands for human rights.

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In The News

Can India And Iran Rekindle Their 1990s-Era Romance?

After a difficult 15 years, relations between New Delhi and Tehran are in need of improvement. The recent visit in India by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani was key first step.

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In The News

Valentine’s Day Violence In India, A Culture And Policing Divide

India’s police and political leaders need to find better ways to halt regular acts of vandalism on Valentine’s Day by those who want to block Western influence.

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In The News

On ‘Love Jihad,’ When India’s Patriarchy Mixes With Bad Faith

‘Love jihad’ is a brutally constructed political agenda combining patriarchal notions of ‘our women’ and communal notions of ‘their men.’

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In The News

Muslim Women’s Rights, A New Favorite Smokescreen Of Strongmen

The authoritarian and religious men leading Saudi Arabia, Iran and India are using women’s rights progress for purposes other than helping women.

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Ideas Society

India-Pakistan, A Cricket Metaphor For Nationalism

NEW DELHI — Farooque was a Kashmiri. He hated India. His cousin was killed by security forces at a demonstration in Srinagar. This was 1990. We were classmates, and I always took him head on for his anti-India rhetoric. Back then, no one minded his bombast, nor our arguments — and life went on. Then came March 1992 and the cricket World Cup. The determined Imran Khan and Pakistan came from behind and won the title. I skipped college the day Pakistan won because I did not have the courage to face Farooque, who was of course ecstatic beyond words […]

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In The News

Could Xi Jinping Bring The Dalai Lama Back Home To Tibet?

NEW DELHI — The impact of the 19th Communist Party of China congress and affirmation of President Xi Jinping as China’s ‘most powerful” leader in decades matters for India — especially on the ‘Tibet Issue,” which also intersects with longstanding conflicts over the Chinese-Indian border. Tibetan leader Dalai Lama’s well-known desire to return home has taken on new urgency, following this November 23 statement: “The past is past, Tibetans want to stay with China,” he said. These words carry a serious political overtone, coming as it does immediately after the 19th party congress and amid the current Doklam border standoff […]

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In The News

When A Movie About Rape Gets Past Pakistan’s Censors

Cleared by the Central Board of Film Censors on appeal, top Pakistani director Shoaib Mansoor’s ‘Verna’ is a flawed film, but a wake-up call for a nation obsessed by patriarchal honor.

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Rahul Gandhi: India’s Comeback Kid?

Slowly but surely, the Congress party is regaining its footing, and the scion to India’s political dynasty, the man who everyone gave up on, has newfound confidence.

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In The News

The Formidable Challenge Of Electrifying Rural India

The current challenge in rural electrification is not just connecting households, but providing sufficient, affordable and high-quality supply.

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Geopolitics Green Or Gone

In Pakistan, Arsenic-Laced Water Puts Millions At Risk

BENGALURU — In vintage crime novels, there is often someone murdered by slow poisoning, and arsenic has been a common weapon of choice. It works the same way in your body — slowly killing you — if it is present in the water you drink beyond a certain threshold. This is why it’s disturbing that, according to a new study, the groundwater along the densely populated Indus river basin in Pakistan is severely contaminated with arsenic, putting the health of over 50 million people at risk. Arsenic occurs naturally in Earth’s crust. It is used by humans in some alloys […]

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In The News

Turns Out, India’s Cash Ban Was All For Nothing

-Analysis- BENGALURU — The patient was the Indian economy. Among the 176 countries that have been ranked by Transparency International on a scale from 100 (very clean) to zero (highly corrupt), India ranks in the second half of the list at 79, with illegal money of sizeable proportions. The central government, which was elected on the promise of a cleaner government, is worried about coming to power again. With the impending election two years away, it had to do something drastic: a much-dreaded surgery with uncertain consequences. That was the November 2016 decision of removing Rs 500 and Rs 1000 […]

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In The News

Signs Of Resistance To India’s Glaring Social Apartheid

Discrimination and exploitation are deeply rooted in India. But rather than silently endure, some in the underclasses are raising their voices in defiance.

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In The News

Universal Stakes, Who Owns The Rights For Space Exploitation

Tiny Luxembourg is taking a leading role in devising the laws necessary to regulate the business of space exploration.

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In The News

The Growing Weight On India’s Women Farmers

As more men are migrating into cities in search of a living, women are left with all the weight of the farming and family. That is not a sustainable model.

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