People's Democracy

on file

ONE of the most popular indices used to measure inequality in distribution of family income is the Gini index.

It rates countries on a scale of 0 to 100, where 0 implies perfect equality (each family earns the same) and 100 implies an extreme of inequality. Here’s what the Gini index shows:

Belarus, with the lowest rating of 21.7, tops the equality charts out of 106 countries for which data are available. Hungary, Denmark, Japan and Sweden round off the list of the top five. Belarus is not the only former socialist nation to do well on the index. Most East European nations do fairly well as do Scandinavian countries, which are known for their welfare states. Between them, East Europe and Scandinavia account for nine of the first ten and 14 of the first 20 slots.

Interestingly, Russia does much worse than almost all of the other republics that formed the erstwhile Soviet Union. The extent to which mafias monopolised the economy in its transition from state ownership to private hands may account for this.

--- The Times of India, November 27

THE girl child has become the unintended victim of the recurring drought and crop failure in Andhra Pradesh, even as suicides by farmers show no signs of abating.

The deprivation, often exacerbated by the death of the family bread earner, has made the life of girl children unbearable in rural areas. While many families marry off their daughters immediately after they reach puberty, others send them to work as bonded labourers or push them into the flesh trade.

Drought-hit districts in Telengana and Rayalaseema have become hunting grounds for pimps and brokers from Mumbai and Goa, who recruit young girls from indebted families, promising them jobs and a good life.

--- Hindustan Times, November 27

WOMEN are the worst victims of war and conflicts but yet invisible in any peace negotiation. Years after peace accords are signed, widows in refugee camps, are unable to return to their former homes.

Studies have shown the experience of women and men in situations of tensions, war, and post-conflict reconstruction was significantly different. About 80 per cent of civilian casualties are women and 80 per cent of all refugees and internally displaced people worldwide are women and children.

--- The Hindu, November, 30, 2004 

THE culture police is on the prowl again. The Bajrang Dal has issued a terse “firman” (fiat) to its cadre to “cut off the nose” of Hindu girls having affairs with Muslim boys.

The diktat is loud and clear. Try to persuade Hindu girls to keep away from boys of the minority community, but if they persist “do what Lakshman did to Suparnakha”, says the Bajrang Dal fatwa issued on a VHP letterhead…..

The (UP) state unit of the Bajrang Dal chalked out the plan to stop “inter- religion” marriages in Uttar Pradesh at its meeting on Thursday. The organisation has decided to raise an army of youth to “tackle the situation”.

--- Hindustan Times, November 26, 2004

THE International Committee of the Red Cross has charged that the US military has used psychological and sometimes physical coercion “tanamount to torture” on detenus at the Guantanamo Bay facility.

The Red Cross has been visiting the facility regularly and has issued many critical reports but this is the first time it used torture. The findings, which have come after an investigation team visited the facility in June, have been passed on to the US government which has expectedly brushed then aside…..

The Red Cross team consisting of humanitarian workers and medical personnel has also found that some doctors and medical workers were participating in the planning of interrogations, a practice regarded as a violation of medical ethics…

The report has said the team had found a system to break the will of the detenus and make them wholly dependent on their interrogators through “humiliating acts, solitary confinement, temperature extremes, use of forced positions.” The team also said the methods were increasingly “more refined and repressive” than during their previous trips.

--- The Hindu, December 1, 2004