India Archive

Indian authorities need to completely overhaul the country’s police systems to address rampant human rights abuses that undermine India’s progress and the rule of law, Human Rights Watch says in a new report. The existing system, HRW charges in “Broken System: Dysfunction, Abuse and Impunity in the Indian Police,” has failed to evolve beyond the repressive characteristics instilled during colonial times and not only encourages abuse, but facilitates it. Torture, extortion, arbitrary detentions and extrajudicial killings are considered common practice. “When they were first constituted as a colonial force in the 1800’s they were taught to use repression, fear — […]

NEW DELHI — Two weeks after issuing a joint statement in Egypt that was welcomed around the world as a much-needed step towards narrowing their differences through dialogue, India and Pakistan have returned to their previously stated, belligerent positions. The two neighbours, whose history of conflict goes back over six decades, have backed off from the eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation witnessed after the Mumbai terror attacks last November. But fresh questions are being raised here about Pakistan’s resolve in acting against terror groups active against India. The U.S. has helped keep the peace between the two countries in the past. After the […]