India Shuffle: Torture, Rotting Food & China’s Burma Visit

Posting has been light while I lay around in the midst of a feverish delirium from whatever horrific Delhi parasite had decided to work its way into my bloodstream. I appear to have survived the worst, which is no small fortune given that the city is currently going through outbreaks of Dengue fever, cholera and conjunctivitis (“eye flu”, to the locals).

TRYING TO BAN TORTURE – Fahun Mustafa, a UN special rapporteur, discusses the use of torture by Indian police, which he says stems from the Indian Mutiny of 1857 and the resulting methods of control installed by the British in the Indian Police Act 1862. The police became an instrument of domination by the political elite, rather than an institution for serving the public good. Added to which there is severe understaffing (one policeman to 1,037 citizens, compared with a global average of 333). The government is trying to implement a new Prevention of Torture Act, but critics say it has barely been discussed with civil rights groups and will do little to alter the culture of official impunity or the underlying factors that give rise to torture in the first place.

ROTTING FOOD – There was further uproar in the lower house of parliament as the monsoon session came to an end, over the government’s failure to distribute millions of tonnes of grain that are rotting away in storage facilities around the country. The Supreme Court ordered the government in August to start giving this away for free, but Minister of Agriculture Sharad Pawar says they can’t afford to do so. This being the same government that found $8.5 million for a fancy balloon for the Commonwealth Games.

CHINESE NAVAL VISIT – China has docked a couple of warships at the Myanmar port of Thilawa, the first visit to the country by the People’s Liberation Army-Navy. With their eye on protecting trade routes and securing energy supplies, both China and India have been vigorously courting Myanmar in recent years. In this Indian Express story at least, there is an acceptance that this is legitimate business on the part of China rather than a threatening sign of strategic encirclement. Still, a significant part of the security establishment views China’s actions in the Indian Ocean as something illegitimate and fearsome.

IN BRIEF:
The Supreme Court is reopening the Bhopal gas disaster case in the wake of the absurdly low sentences handed out earlier this year.

The 85 days of protest in Kashmir have cost businesses there a total of $4.5 billion, according to the local Chamber of Commerce.

Someone’s been dumping vast amounts of burnt oil off the Goan coast.