Human Rights: May 2007 Archives

05/25/07 - 65% population of Jharkhand is Bengali speaking. Yet Bengali is not even taught in the schools. No Bengali textbook is available. The state of Jharkhand gives no recognition to the Bengali language. For this reason, Amra Bangali took out a rally on 28 th March 2007, at Ranchi and submitted a memorandum to the Governor of Jharkhand with the following demands:

• Bengali should be the medium of all state correspondence - official as well as unofficial.



• Bengali speaking teachers must be posted to teach Bengali in schools and colleges.



• Bengali should become the medium of education.



• Textbooks should be made immediately available in Bengali language.



• Local people (Nagpuria speaking people) - including Bengali speaking - all sons of the soil should be given 100% employment in Government and non-Government jobs.



• All sign boards, all announcements and circulars should be in Bengali language.



• Bengali regiments should be created in the Armed forces of India.

"What we really need is a process of value addition, so that we can export things as finished products. The conditions for signing an EPA do not guarantee that process will take place"

BRUSSELS (IPS) - Anti-poverty campaigners have likened trade negotiations between the European Union (EU) and several regions in Africa to a boxing match between a schoolboy novice and a heavyweight champion.

Such disparity appears particularly evident in the case of the EU's talks with governments from Eastern and Southern Africa, with whom Brussels wishes to sign an Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) by the end of this year.

In one corner, the 27-strong EU boasts half of the Group of Eight top industrialised nations (France, Italy, Britain and Germany). In the other, 13 of the 16 Eastern and Southern African countries taking part in the talks have been recognised by the United Nations as among the poorest.

Similarly, the level of integration on each side is in no way comparable.