Blog 4

The article I read for this week’s blog was on the treatment of women in India. According to the article the police in India doesn’t care that day by day women get sexually harassed. In India most women have learned to “accept” the treatment they get. Everywhere they go women get groped, fondled and teased. The worst part about this situation is that there is nothing women can do about it. It’s so bad that the men feel safe groping and bother women in public places. If a woman gets the courage to go TRY and file a report they get laughed at and kicked out of the police station.

The author of the article stressed that if the laws and the police enforcement in India doesn’t change then the citizens are going to keep doing what they do. The police doesn’t just ignore the woman about sexual harassments, they ignore everything if their paid off! If the government doesn’t do anything to change the situation in India nobody will.

The rape and death of the young girl in Deli is what started to stir things up. According to the reporter the woman was gang rapped and died two weeks later from the injuries. The friend that was with her was also badly beaten when he tried to protect her. In the newspapers we read all about the story. What wasn’t in the newspaper was that from Delhi to Tamilnadu state government official replied to the Supreme Court by saying “we don’t care”. We don’t care! That’s what the government official had to say.

People elsewhere didn’t really know how bad things are in India because the news doesn’t tell us everything. The Supreme Court set up PCA’s in every district but the police don’t care, they keep doing what they’re doing. Even the people who work for the PCA’s don’t care. It seems like no one cares about these poor girls who suffer day by day!

http://www.indiatogether.org/2012/dec/sbv-pca.htm

Dalila Aguilar

2/21/13

10:18 Pm

Deadly Air Pollution in India

Deadly Air Pollution in India

The article I found for this week’s blog is about the pollution problem in India.  Air quality in India has decreased drastically over the past decade and is continuing to get worse while causing major health problems to India’s people.  More than a million people in India die each year from indoor air pollution and around 620,000 people because of outdoor pollution.  An additional study found that air pollution causes 20% of lung cancers and 6% of high blood pressure cases.  The air quality of homes in rural India is ten times worse than the indoor air quality guidelines of the United States Environment Protection Agency.

The article reports that poor indoor air quality is due to tobacco smoking in the home and to the solid fuels used for cooking.  "Around one million lives, especially of women, can be saved every year in India, if all solid fuels used for cooking in rural India is replaced with LPG.”  Rising particle matter in outdoor air pollution has made this a hazard for human health, and air pollution is now ranked the fifth biggest cause of deaths in India.  The Central Pollution Control Board in India claims that only two cities monitored by them have an air quality worth breathing.  These cities are Malapuram and Pathanamthitta.

This article is missing some important information to guide the reader in knowing what the causes of the pollution problem are.  The article gives a couple of examples, like indoor tobacco smoking and the solid fuels used for cooking, but that doesn’t tell the reader anything about outdoor pollution factors. 

The pollution problem in India is a major social problem.  Just in the past decade, the air quality in India has decreased exponentially compared to the decades prior.  Could this increase in pollution be a product of globalization?  The fact that India has a worse indoor air quality than many other countries outdoor air quality is a new idea to me.  This is the first time I have considered indoor air quality when thinking about air quality and pollution problems. 

Carly Taylor

February 14, 2013 9:03 PM

http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/NewDelhi/Indoor-air-pollution-kills-a-million-people-every-year-in-India/Article1-1015749.aspx

Human Rights and Children in India

India and Child Abuse       
    A report stated that sexual abuse on children has become a big problem that has not been solved yet. Although it has become "disturbingly common," and awareness of this issue is very high it continues to be a problem for these children. Most of the people who have the power to fix this widespread issue this are not only ill prepared to handle these cases, but they also have the tendency to worsen the situation rather than fix it. Children are abused in various places such as home, school, orphanages, and in their own neighborhoods. Most of these cases, unfortunately, are not reported. When they are reported by these children the reaction of the government and law enforcement is not enough to fix the problem and help these victims. In addition to this, the process is traumatic for these victims and because of the additional pain they have to go through when they report it, sometimes it is better for the kids not to even report it. Meenakshi Ganguly said that of all incidences of child abuse only 3 percent of it is actually reported. The responses by the police is also a big part of the problem. One example was a 12-year-old girl that was raped by a man who was a member of a politically high ranking family. He was put in jail for about two weeks, but the police wanted and insisted that the young girl needed to change her story. The Integrated Child Protection was introduced to help protect children, but the ideas presented by this have not been put into action.
    I found this report very sad. As adults it is our job to protect our children. Not just our own kids, but other children too. A child should not be a target of such horrific crimes. These innocents can't even go to school or home without being targeted by adults. No child should be taken advantage of in such a way. It is our job to keep these kids safe and the people who can are not. The people that they should be able to trust, are the very ones doing them harm.
   

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/02/07/child-sexual-abuse-rampant-and-untreated-in-india-report-says/?ref=freedomandhumanrights

Molly Winfree
2/8/13
12:25 am

Setback in Human Rights for India

                                                             India and Human Rights
    India has experienced a setback when it comes to human rights. Women have continued to be targets of violence and so far nothing has been done to change this. Not only have these violent acts not been stopped, but nothing has been done in the protection of their freedom of speech. The Human Rights Watch made it known that they were unhappy with the lack of changes they saw in regards to sexual violence towards these women. Those in the public eye or in power (public officials) have also not been punished or held responsible for their acts. However, this is not for lack of trying. The government has been trying to fix these problems, but its problem is with executing these plans and getting them to start helping these victims. Although the government has made recommendations on fixing how these issues are handled and they are trying to change things it still has not happened. Part of that is because public officials and other people with power are not held responsible for their actions. Ms. Ganguly said, "India needs a stronger system of accountability for public officials and better training and sensitization of the police." Freedom of speech has also suffered a setback because of the lack of protection of this right. Social media has become a problem as well. The government in India is called "heavy handed" when it comes to restrictions on the use of social media. There has been a ban for youtube and facebook in Kashmir and two women in Mumbia were arrested for what they were doing on facebook. It was said that the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (lets soldiers violate rights) needs to be rejected as well. Although these are serious issued that they are still trying to fix some ground has been made in other areas of human rights. Within the last year children have been given protection from sexual abuse, more medical care centers have been encouraged, and suspects of the 2002 Gujarat riots have been convicted.
    I thought this was a very interesting article because it said several times how the government itself is trying to fix these problems. Just reading the title I thought the government was intentionally revoking human rights, but after reading this I learned that many are trying to fix this problem for these women. These issues are particularly important because everybody should be able to live without fear of being attacked. Anybody who violates that should be punished without a doubt. People should be able to live with the peace of mind that somebody cannot just walk up and do them harm regardless of their gender, race, class, sexuality, etc. This article was important, I thought, because it addresses the safety of people, their right to speak, governments ability to handle these issues, and people being held accountable by the government for any violation of basic human rights.

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/02/01/human-rights-violation-on-the-rise-in-india-recent-report-says/

Molly Winfree
2/1/13
4:06 pm