News in Brief

The newly elected Bihar Assembly has an all-time low representation of Muslims. Only 16 Muslims could make it to the 243-member Assembly. The Assembly elected in February 2005 (which did not however lead to formation of a Government), had 24 MLAs. The house had 32 Muslim MLAs in the last term when Rashtriya Janata Dal led a coalition government in Bihar. The new JD(U)-BJP government has two Muslim ministers, Monazir Ahsan and Manzar Alam. The last Rabri Devi government had five Muslim ministers. The emergence of the new alliance on the power front has witnessed considerable marginalisation of Muslims in the power structure of the State where Muslims constitute 16 per cent of population. It is largely attributed to eclipse of the RJD which had raised a formidable social alliance of Muslims and Yadavs with marginal support of the scheduled castes.

Prominent human rights, women rights groups and social activists have come out strongly against the provisions of the Communal Violence (prevention, control and rehabilitation of victims) Bill 2005, introduced in the Parliament recently, stating that it totally failed to achieve its purpose. “The government did not consult civil society groups or attempt to forge a national consensus on a Bill of such importance,’’ they said. The need to bring in an anti-communal violence law arose in view of the increasing communalisation across the country, particularly in the light of the 2002 Gujarat riots. Such a law was expected to increase the powers of citizens against the government, the police and the civil administration. The government introduced a Bill in the Rajya Sabha to provide more teeth to both Centre and States to prevent and control communal violence. The Bill, however, does not have the provision for direct intervention of the Central government in the event of communal violence in any state.


The Bill has also been put on the Home Ministry’s website, www.mha.nic.in

Atif Nasir Mulla, a key accused in the Mulund bomb blast case was released on a bail of Rs 25,000 by the High Court recently. Mulla is the only one to have got bail in the Mulund blast case. Atif’s father Nasir Mulla said, “we knew he was innocent all through. He was in solitary confinement for 32 months.” On April 15, 2003, Atif, the second accused in the Mulund bomb blast case (Saquib Nachan being the prime accused) was arrested under POTA near the Bandra-Kurla complex. The blast had taken place in a local train at Mulund on March 13, 2003. Defence advocate, Mubin Solkar had stated in the bail application that the recovery of weapons like AK-56 and magazines was false, as there was no corroborative material. Also, even when there was no confessional statement by Atif himself, the confessions of co-accused were used against him, which is not permissible, said the application.