By: Kapou Malakar and Kinley Tshering

Soma, mother of three-year-old Ayesha, scouts the East Delhi schools regularly these days. She looks tensed, annoyed and anxious. Some may take her for an ill person but that is not true. This picture is quite apparent these days when nursery admission is round the corner. Parents like Soma are having nightmares trying hard to get their children admitted in a nursery school.

Delhi government enhanced the budget for education in its 2007 budget to 34.2% of the total allocation. The Directorate of Education (DOE) has recognized 1,185 unaided public schools and 221 aided schools for nursery education in Delhi alone.

Despite this fact, parents are still caught in the mess of admission of their children. Many parents are unable to get their children’s admission in the school of their choice as most of the popular schools are located in certain pockets of the city which is far away form their residences.

Shyama Chona, the Principal of DPS RK Puram School says, “we follow a point system and we give points to a child on the basis of location proximity (neighborhood criteria), sibling of a child studying in a school and if the parents of the child is our alumni.”

But the criteria recommended by the schools seem to have created problems for the parents.

“Everybody has a desire to make their children study in a branded school. But neighborhood point curb that chance,” says Arvind Singh, a resident of Pitampura.

Moreover, this point system does not seem to favor the lower middle class families and parents who are not graduates. “Undergraduate parents receive only 5 or 6 points where else graduate parents receive 15 points which helps them, easily get their children admitted in the school,” says Shabeena, a resident of Okhla.

DOE has already released their guideline for nursery admission. According to it, no interview will be held for parents and child, by the school authorities for nursery admission. Even Supreme Court upheld the High Court’s decision to curtail down the age of the child at three for the admission into a nursery school.

By: Dipu Shaw
Photo: Rozy Ibrahim
One thing responsible for fuelling the anger of the people living in the Jamia Nagar area, after the Batla House encounter, was that they remained uninformed about the state of affairs. They did not get any detailed briefing about the incident. The case apparently lacked transparency.
The September 19, police encounter in Delhi’s Jamia Nagar killed two suspected terrorists allegedly involved in Delhi serial blasts, Atif Ameen and Mohammad Sajed, along with a police officer, Mohan Chand Sharma.

One and a half months after the case, the truth about the encounter and subsequent arrests that followed it, still remains shrouded in mystery. Even under the Right To Information Act, the various departments that were related to the case have denied to pass on the information. It leaves a suspicion that there is a deliberate attempt to camouflage the truth.
The Jaiprakash Narayan Apex Trauma Centre of AIIMS has turned down the request to provide information about the post mortem reports saying that the case was related to Medico Legal Records.

They refused to provide information under Sections 8(1) b and 8(1) h of the RTI to a petitioner, Afroz Alam Sahil.

Section 8(1) b of the Right To Information Act – 2005 states that information which has been expressly forbidden to be published by any court of law or tribunal or the disclosure of which may constitute contempt of court cannot be provided to a RTI petitioner.
Section 8(1) h states that information cannot be provided about matters which would impede the process of investigation or apprehension or prosecution of the offenders.


Wrong arguments

Both do not apply to the Batla House Encounter case, according to experts. “The arguments given by AIIMS is totally baseless”, says Prashant Bhushan, Supreme Court lawyer. “No orders or ruling has been passed by the court to withhold information regarding the case. And by no means it can amount to contempt of court”, he adds.
Asked if the information in any way could impede the process of investigation, the seasoned lawyer says, “What does it have to do with the investigations?”

The Delhi police

The Delhi Police has also tried to evade questions on the issue. It prefers to answer only three out of the six questions asked in a RTI petition in connection with the encounter and subsequent arrests. The answers too are only denials instead of information.
It declined to provide the post mortem report of the deceased in the case citing section 8(1)h of the RTI Act-05 as AIIMS had done. Interestingly, the Office of the Dy. Commissioner of Police, Crime, Delhi, makes no mention of the other questions asked in the petition. The petitioner had also asked to provide the number of people arrested in connection to the serial blasts in the capital on September 13 and the places from where they were arrested. In addition, it was asked if the police have evidence against those who have been arrested. The Delhi police did not feel it was necessary to answer these questions.
According to the National Human Rights Commission, so far 2560 cases of police encounter/alleged fake encounter has come up before it. The Commission has so far granted compensation in sixteen cases of police encounter/alleged fake encounter. The statistics adds to the suspicion of the people. The Delhi Police has not done anything substantial to alleviate doubts from the minds of the people of the community. Poor reporting and confusion on the part of journalists has also helped the cause of doubts and distrust.
contact Dipu Shaw at:conciousdipu@gmail.com

Posted By : Akanksha Kukreti, Ramashanker Pandey

Photo By : Gargi Nim

Students of 24 Central universities have gone on two days hunger strike at Jantar-Mantar to oppose the Lyngdoh Committee’s recommendations .Akanksha Kukreti and Ramashanker Pandey reports through a radio story.

वासिफुद्दीन डागर ध्रुपद संगीत के एक मशहूर गायक हैं । ध्रुपद संगीत भारत की सबसे पुरानी परम्पराओं में से एक है । पिछले दिनों वासिफुद्दीन डागर जामिया मिल्लिया इस्लामिया में थे। इस अवसर पर उन्होंने मॉस कम्युनिकेशन रिसर्च सेंटर से बात की । प्रस्तुत है बात चीत के अंश, राज जय द्वारा ।

चाचा नेहरू के बच्चों से अथाह प्रेम के कारण १४ नवंबर, उनके जन्मदिन का यह दिन बाल दिवस के रूप में मनाया जाता है। यह दिन बच्चों के लिए ख़ुशी और आज़ादी का दिन है। साथ ही मौज मस्ती से कुछ पल निकालकर उन महान हस्तियों के जीवन से कुछ प्रेरणा लेने का , जिन्हें बच्चों से ख़ास लगाव था और उनकी बच्चों से बहुत सी उम्मीदें जुडी थी।
फोटो फीचर:गार्गी निम

मस्ती के कुछ पल
हम भी हैं जोश में
क्या मैं भी खेल सकता हूँ

हम हैं तो क्या ग़म है