The Guardian

A report on the Gurjjar blockade explains the issue in the context of reservations. The Indian government, it says, runs the world’s largest affirmative action programme by reserving 50 per cent of government jobs and university places for those who suffered for centuries under caste oppression. The problem with the Gurjjar community, it adds, is that the British labelled them a criminal tribe, and though the Indian establishment calls them backward, they feel they are not considered “backward enough” to reap the full benefits of reservations. The report cites historians who debate on the relative injustice perpetrated on the community by the British and by the caste system. It ends with the words of those who feel that the Gurjjar case highlights the dangers of caste-based reservations and that “succumbing to the Gurjjars’ demands would simply lead to a race to the bottom”.

The Economist

This report from Raipur is an indictment of the Indian Union and the Chhattisgarh state government’s laws against Maoists. The story begins with the plight of Dr Binayak Sen, the PUCL activist who has spent more than a year in jail and whose trial began in April. While the report mentions the violence the Maoists periodically show themselves capable of, it criticises the Indian penal code and the draconian Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act for meting out inhuman treatment—Sen was allegedly guilty of passing on letters from a jailed Maoist. The Economist also takes the state government to task for relying on vigilante groups without doing much for public security. The state is not likely to win the case against Sen, with his cause having been taken up by 22 Nobel laureates. In fact, the Special Public Security Act is now backfiring on the government.

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