Indian law

Sometimes, I find Indian laws utterly incapable.

This week, I was working on the story dealing with voyeurism. I found Information Technology Act very stringent but half-prepared.

The IT Act 67 says, Whoever publishes or transmits or causes to be published in the electronic form, any material which is lascivious or appeals to the prurient interest or if its effect is such as to tend to deprave and corrupt persons who are likely, having regard to all relevant circumstances, to read, see or hear the matter contained or embodied in it, shall be punished.

But on the use of obscene material for self-gratification, the law is silent.

So imagine that there is a peeping tom in the mall, clicks images of a woman’s private moments from trial room and keep it for self use.

Can this voyeurist be charged ? I don’t think so.

Taking pictures without knowledge in private places is infringement of privacy, hence, can be charged. In this case however, he is in mall, a public place, although the trial room isn’t. Second, he is using the images for self-gratification.


IPC 509 that deals with outraging modesty of woman can put him in jail. But then the punishment under IPC 509 isn’t as severe as IT act.


Under such circumstances, an intelligent officer will implicate the accused different way. The officer will make sure that those images on computer.

Well, transmission has been done, so as the crime.
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Another case: A person having sex with woman below 16 even with her free consent is rape. The age of consent for sex, as per IPC 376, is 16 years while her official age for marriage is 18.

Interestingly, Sexual intercourse by a man with his own wife, the wife not being under fifteen but is below 16, is not rape.

Pawar, Blast and arrests

Okay. Now since Sharad Pawar has finally reacted on Ketkar controversy, it is my moral duty to react on his reaction, especially after previous post. As a guest editor of Maharashtra Times, Pawar through his edit thrashed Mete. Just for a day, the man of political breed put his foot in journalist’s shoes, and surprisingly enough, change was there in his tune too.

Having said this, I still stand firm on my theory. The time now is to see how R R headed home department acts against Mete.


Moving on to Hindu radicals arrested in Thane and Navi Mumbai blasts cases. Bal Thackeray’s today’s edit is quite hilarious, only if we picks up first five lines. It turns dangerous thereafter.

Yes, I too thought it was a job of some Hindu organization and not the Islamists’. And I have enough reasons to think so.

First, the bomb didn’t wreak much damage.

Second, it was crude and not the sophisticated bomb.

Third, police took much more time to make arrests- normally after any deadly blasts, police ‘swiftly’ act and arrest few people from specific community. And even before the thorough probe, police slap MCOCA on them. Many in the crime reporting feels, most such arrests are police's attempts to cover up their failure.

These things didn’t happen in Navi Mumbai and Thane blasts cases for which Hindu radicals have been accused.

post-mortem of attack and action

Vinayak Mete, the alleged mastermind of attack on Kumar Ketkar’s house has been sacked from the post of NCP vice president. The delayed action against him, conspicuous silence from NCP upper echelons and the criticism of attack from few non-Maratha leaders have different theories taking rounds. The action against Mete in itself is a façade.

A popular theory first drawn immediately after attack was Mete was unhappy in the party following denial of MLC post to him. This was followed by another presumption: It was just to get publicity and shot into fame overnight. Analyzing the attack, some stated that confusion prevailing among leaders and workers because of party’s flip-flop on various issues. And now after action, a new theory has come up. It states that to attack was to contain Ketkar, who was being over critical against government’s failure in the recent past.

Well, I think, the attack has its roots in the caste-politics that rules the game. There are few things one need to look into. First, although Mete is very well a leader of the party, the attack was carried out by his little known organization called Shiv Sangram. A resemblance that was to be drawn out from the attack on Bhandarkar Institute. Sambhaji brigade, which enjoys silent and not so silent support of NCP, was responsible for the four-year-old attack. The common thread in both attacks is: Chattrapati Shivaji. This time however, there was no single word against Shivaji in Ketkar's editorial, and Mete knew it well.

Second, post attack on Ketkar, only few NCP leaders including Gurunath Kulkarni, D P Tripathi openly criticized the action. The most coveted reaction from Sharad Pawar never came. Why didn’t Pawar in clear terms criticized Mete or why not strict action has been taken against him (Mete) by party ?. Pawar, whose family is set to launch newly launched english daily, in Delhi by mid-August, won't. He will neither invite wrath from maratha communiy nor let the his family owned daily to be isolated.

R R Patil, spoke, but as a Batmidar says, it was ‘government language’.

Many remember, immediately after attack on BORI, Pawar’s first reaction was critical. However the very next day in an election rally in Pune, Pawar in unambiguous terms criticized the controversial book on Shivaji. The equations changed thereafter and party got enough ammo for general elections.

To put it into perspective, we need to couple both the incidents, plus, few recent developments. The elections are drawing closer; both NCP and Congress anticipate heavy anti-incumbency wave. The Shiv sena and recently born MNS have taken up issue of Marathi while congress enjoys non-Marathi and non-maratha vote-bank.

For the inclusion in OBC category, a demand has been made by dominant caste in the state, to which government has not said NO. The state government, possibly influenced by Gujjar effect, has also begun preliminary preparations for this. Chhagan Bhujbal’s samata parishad too is gaining momentum.

Amidst such situation NCP has one safe card to play. The same card they played in last general elections. It hopes to play the card and win over elections this time too.

Obama

Finally its all over. Obama has won the nomination. I am bit nervous. Throughout the primaries, I pitched for Mrs. Clinton.

Here, I take a recourse. My favourite henceforth will be McCain.

I know, Obama is better choice, for US. But then Hillary was best, for India. McCain is good for Indo-US, I believe.

History tells, democrats have been good to India. This time, a new history has been written. Obama while capping a rapid rise from political obscurity, made a history.

ammmmmm ?.......hmmmmmm

Hmm. No post since long.

In fact there are too many subjects to write. But then there is too little to scribble here.

Writing something about the work would invite wrath from the company. Constructing poem is like clearing mathematics question paper, which I have never done. Reviewing books are okay. But then for that I need to read.

Few things are sacred to me and too personal. So no mentioning.

Scribbling inside stories from profession is the thing I am bored of doing. This job is best being done by best of bhankas, formerly, Let us Bhankas.

Narrating few embarrassing, but equally interesting, moments that my friends had to recover from is not in the interest of mine. They are after all my readers.

A friend has already advised me to shut down this blog. People like us (he too is a journalist) already harass people by forcing them read our stories. So it is in the larger interest of society that we abstain from writing further, friend sermon.

Any option left ?