PATENT LAW AND CONTROVERSY

Patent error

 A US governmental agency, the International Trade Commission (ITC), recently initiated an inquiry into allegations that India’s IP regime was flawed and at odds with US business interests. The present controversy highlights the US’s efforts to coerce India to amend its national IP regime to suit the former’s business interests.

Clearly, multinational pharmaceutical companies are upset with India’s rigorous patent threshold. In other countries, patent regimes are routinely gamed to protect and even promote the evergreening of drugs (that is, when an old drug that is off patent is modified ever so slightly so that an additional patent monopoply can be procured).
 India, in its 2005 amendments to the patents act, sent a clear message that it would not suffer evergreening. The “notorious” Section 3(d) has been used to axe many an evergreening attempt, the most significant being Novartis’s anti-cancer drug, Glivec.

In similar vein, India went on to grant a compulsory licence to Bayer’s excessively priced anti-cancer drug (selling at Rs 2.8 lakh a month), paving the way for a cheaper generic to enter the market at Rs 8,800 per month. All of this was done in conformity with Indian patent law and WTO obligations. More importantly, the licence was issued after a rigorous judicial process.

The Bayer and the Novartis cases will no doubt take centrestage at this inquiry, triggered by senators who complained, among other things, that India “has applied its patent law in a discriminatory manner, particularly against innovative US pharmaceutical companies, so as to advantage its domestic industries”.

In what appears to be a bid to show India in poor light at these hearings, the US Chamber of Commerce’s Global IP Centre (GIPC) issued a timely report ranking the IP regimes of a curious assortment of 25 countries. Unsurprisingly, the US topped the list and India came in last. The Chamber of Commerce has now gone on to demand that the US trade representative classify India as a “priority foreign country”, a status reserved for the worst IP offenders and one that could potentially lead to trade sanctions. Given that the GIPC report was authored by prominent members of a thinktank (Pugatch Consilium) who consult significantly with big pharma, it is reasonable to suspect its “independence”.

This is more than evident from a methodology that seems designed to make India look bad.
First, the report lumps together a diverse set of countries, without regard to their socio-economic status or their developmental imperatives. If history is any indication, almost every country had minimalist IP protection at the start of its technological trajectory and moved to a maximalist IP position when its indigenous units had built sufficient capacity. Indeed, as the American historian, Doron Ben Atar, reminds us, the US was once a “pirate” economy, with American enterprises being encouraged to “borrow” freely from European technology.

Second, there is no real mention of why the GIPC report picked the indicators they did or how it weighted them. For instance, the baseline value of the compulsory licencing index and the consequent ranking is extremely critical of any issuance of a licence, even when it is fully compliant with WTO-TRIPS norms.

Third, much of the ranking rests on “perception” and, conveniently enough, the perception of US multinationals that have faced difficulty extracting excessive patent rents from India. Relying on perception, particularly when patent numbers and “data” abound, is not just shoddy but dishonest.

Last, there is a delicious paradox underlying the flawed GIPC ranking and methodology. The report appears premised on the perception that an IP regime that offers more protection to inventions, even trivial ones, is a “strong” one. Countries such as India, which stands for genuine invention and will not suffer low quality evergreened varieties, are surprisingly labelled as “weak”. In fact, stretched to its logical limit, the GIPC index would suggest a score of “infinity” for any country granting an “eternal” patent or copyright term, pushing it right to the top of its rankings.

Natco wins Indian patent dispute case

Natco Pharmaceuticals, the Hyderabad-based drug manufacturer, has won a patent case against Teva Pharmaceuticals of Israel.

The New Delhi High Court, on February 28, dismissed Teva’s suit seeking an injunction over the marketing of a generic version of multiple sclerosis drug, copaxone (glatiramer acetate) in the U.S. While Teva does not have a patent on the drug in India, the injunction sought to prevent Natco exporting it.

The decision could allow Natco to launch generic version of Teva’s Copaxone in the U.S., subject to approval from the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (USFDA).

The patent on the $4 billion sales drug, expires in the U.S. on May 24, 2014.

 Natco has been selling it in India since 2007, and plans to market it with partner U.S.-based pharma giant Mylan with whom it has a global marketing alliance since 2008.

Teva sued Natco, seeking an injunction as it alleged Natco’s move infringed on its process patent.
 Natco took on big global pharma in the past having won a case against Novartis for its blood cancer drug, Glivec last year and also receiving India’s first compulsory license (CL) on the kidney cancer drug Nexavar made by Bayer.

Govt mulls cancer drug patent waiver

Health Min Writes To DIPP On Ending Protection For Bristol-Myers’ Dasatinib

Sidhartha TNN 

New Delhi: The health ministry has reopened the issue of waiving a global drug giant’s patent rights for Dasatinib, a cancer drug, arguing the move is needed to deal with an “emergency”. The latest development — which the ministry expects will go through — comes at a time when India has won a reprieve from the US over its intellectual property regime but is facing flak from the civil society, which is critical of the government “going soft” on affordability and availability of medicines for life-threatening diseases. 
    In a letter to the department of industrial policy and promotion (DIPP) last week, the health ministry has answered the concerns raised earlier and said the cost of the drug produced by pharma major Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS) will be met through government schemes. Many experts see BMS along with Pfizer at the forefront of the battle to get the US authorities to downgrade India’s patent regime by a notch and open it to possible punitive action. 
    Officials in DIPP refused to comment on the latest move, but health ministry sources said they plan to use around half-a-dozen schemes to fund the cost of making the drugs available to patients for what is called public non-commercial use and the position has been made clear in last week’s letter. Dasatinib is used to treat chronic myeloid leukemia. 
    If the move goes through, it will be the first instance of the government invoking emergency provisions in the law to waive the patent rights. So far, the compulsory licence provisions have been used by the Patents Office, which waived Bayer Corporation’s patent rights over Nexavar, a renal cancer drug, allowing Natco Pharma to manufacture and sell it at a fraction of the cost. Natco had offered to sell the medicine at Rs 8,800 for a month’s therapy, compared to Bayer’s Rs 2.8 lakh. 
    But unlike last time, this time the government will itself have to issue the compulsory licence, which is provided for in the World Trade Organization’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (Trips). Even in this case, the sources said, the government will have to hear the arguments put forward by BMS to “follow the principles of natural justice”. Once the government issues its order, the Patents Office will be required to notify the availability of a compulsory licence for the drug and will be required to go through another round of hearing. 
    Initially, the health ministry was pushing for compulsory licence for three cancerdrugs, but had to drop plans for two of them. 
    Given the international scrutiny, the government is treading with caution and had earlier turned down health ministry’s plea that the government issue a compulsory licence under section 84 of the Indian Patents Act on the grounds of affordability and had suggested an application be made with the Patents Office. DIPP is extra cautious over the issue as it will undergo the legal process and it does not want to be caught doing something which is against the law. 
    Last October, the Patents Office had rejected an application from BDR Pharma to make a generic version of BMS’s Dasatinib, which is sold under the Sprycel brand. The proposal was rejected on the grounds that the Indian company did not make enough efforts to obtain a voluntary licence for the anti-cancer drug.

US under pressure to act against India

Senate Panel Wants Action At WTO For Violation Of Intellectual Property Rights

Sidhartha TNN 

New Delhi: The US government is coming under intense pressure from lawmakers to act against India at the World Trade Organization (WTO) for what they say are violations of patent rules. The tough stance adopted by US lawmakers raises the pressure on the new Indian government to swiftly swing into action to check against potential damage to bilateral trade ties, which have taken a knock in recent months.
    The demand to move the WTO was made during a meeting of the Senate finance committee on the US administration’s trade policy agenda last Thursday, a day after the US Trade Representative released a report where it refused to downgrade India for its intellectual property rights (IPR) regime. 
    Clearly, the US senators were not satisfied with the response and attacked their government for letting several developing countries, including India, China and Brazil, steal a march. “In 1990s, India and China had limited technical capacity. Now, they can use highly technical standards to advantage their domestic firms and extract American company’s intellectual property for their own use. And it’s a shakedown, plain and simple,” said Ron Wyden, who chairs the US Senate finance committee. 
    Some others went a step further and attacked India. “India’s been pursuing trade policies that undermine US intellectual property to promote its own domestic industries. What they are doing seems to me to be a clear violation of their WTO obligations…enforcement action at the WTO may be the most effective tool that we have to get India to change its behaviour,” said Orrin G Hatch, a Republican from Utah. Similarly, Democrat Robert Menendez pointed to specific concerns over “India’s pharmaceutical patent violations”. 
    In response, USTR Michael Froman said the authorities were concerned “about the deterioration of the innovation environment in India” but was awaiting a dialogue with the new government so that the concerns could be addressed. 
    He specially flagged two concerns, patents and compulsory licensing, issues that are of special interest to global pharmaceutical giants, which have been lobbying with the US authorities as well as with lawmakers. “We’ve been encouraging them to enter into a dialogue about other mechanisms for addressing legitimate concerns about healthcare in India and about access to medicines that do not violate our IPR,” Froman said. 
    Although the Indian government has indicated that it is open to a dialogue, it wants the agenda to include other areas of interest as well. At the same time, officials have ruled out any violation of India’s international commitments on IPRs, arguing that it issued a compulsory licence, which means it waived a company’s patent rights, over a cancer drug for affordability. 
    Similarly, the government maintains that denial of patents was allowed under section 3(d) of Indian Patent Act and did not violate WTO’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of IPR (Trips) if there was no genuine invention or discovery and there was an attempt to merely tweak an existing product to continue with the patents. 
FEELING THE HEAT 
The tough stance by US lawmakers has increased the pressure on the new govt to check against potential damage to bilateral trade ties

U.S. government panel puts India on piracy watch list

ANUJ SRIVAS

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India acquired yet another dubious honour on Wednesday, after it was named to an ‘International Piracy Watch List’ by a U.S. government panel that is looking to highlight countries that are doing little to address high rates of digital piracy.

Being put on this Congressional caucus list may have an impact on the ‘out-of-cycle’ intellectual property review that the Office of the U.S Trade Representative will conduct on India later this year.

“That’s why we started the Watch List – to alert those who are profiting by stealing the hard work of American creators and the countries helping them that we are paying attention and we expect our trading partners to protect intellectual property rights,” said U.S Representative Adam Schiff, who is a member of the Congressional caucus, in a statement. The watch list, which also highlights concerns in China, Russia and Switzerland, points out that India continues to present a “seriously flawed environment” for the promotion of copyright and intellectual property.

“The Special 301 Report again lists India as a priority watch nation. Despite a large domestic creative industry in film, music and other copyright intensive industries, India continues to lag badly in both the legal framework for IP protection,” the report said.

“Among continuing issues in India are extremely high rates of camcording piracy, high levels of unlicensed software use by enterprises, and a lack of effective notice-and-takedown procedures for online piracy,” it added.

A new study recently pointed out that online piracy levels in India remained at 60 per cent, with nearly $2.9 billion of unlicensed software being installed in 2013.

According to non-profit organisation BSA, India is second only to China (over $8.7 billion) in the Asia Pacific region in terms of commercial value of unlicensed software sold in 2013.

India ratifies Marrakesh Treaty for visually impaired

India has become the first country to ratify the Marrakesh Treaty to facilitate access to published works for persons who are visually impaired, or otherwise print disabled. The Treaty was adopted by 79 member countries of the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) on June 27, 2013, and India ratified it on June 24 this year.

India handed over the Instrument of Ratification to WIPO at the 28th session of the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights in Geneva.

The Marrakesh Treaty will come into force once 20 countries ratify it. The treaty requires signatories to adopt national law provisions that facilitate the availability of published works in formats like Braille that are accessible to the blind and allow their exchange across borders by organisations working for the visually impaired.

The treaty will facilitate import of accessible format copies from the member states by the Indian authorised entities such as educational institutions, libraries and other institutions working for the benefit of the visually impaired. This will also facilitate translation of imported accessible format copies and export of accessible format copies in Indian languages.

SCIENCE AND TECH

WHAT GENETIC TESTING CAN DO





What is genetic testing? What is It is a test that identifies changes in chromosomes, genes, or proteins The test can confirm or rule out a suspected genetic condition or help determine a person's chance of Its uses Genetic testing can...
Give a diagnosis if someone has symptoms, say in case of drugresistant tuberculosis Show whether a person is a carrier for a genetic disease. Carriers have an altered gene, but will not get the disease. However, they can pass the altered gene on to their children Help expectant parents know whether an unborn child will have a genetic condition.
This is called prenatal testing Screen newborn infants for abnormal or missing proteins that can cause disease. This is called newborn screening Show whether a person has an inherited disposition to a certain disease before symptoms start Determine the type or dose best for a person. This is called pharmacogenetics developing or passing on a genetic disorder More than 1,000 genetic tests currently in use A test result that can show that a known alteration causing disease is not present in a person can provide a sense of relief The costs The genome sequence for public use was available from 2011, with some tests costing over `50,000. The cost has come down to almost half now The drawback Doctors say all is still not known about the genome or the proteome (the sequences of proteins that make up a single DNA strand)

A sat to net space debris, remove it from Earth's orbit

London





A new European mission aims to rendezvous a satellite with hazardous space debris and render it harmless by netting it like fish.The European Space Agency (ESA)'s ambitious mission called e.DeOrbit would use a satellite to net space debris and remove it from low Earth orbit.
The agency's Clean Space initiative is studying the e.DeOrbit mission for removing all the space debris, aiming to reduce the environmental impact of the space industry on earth and space alike.
“Launches have left earth surrounded by a halo of space junk: more than 17,000 trackable objects larger than a coffee cup, which threaten working missions with catastrophic collision. Even a 1cm nut could hit with the force of a hand grenade,“ ESA said.
The only way to control the debris across low orbits is to remove large items like derelict satellites and launcher upper stages.
The e.DeOrbit is designed to target debris items in well-trafficked polar orbits, between 800km to 1000km altitude. PTI Supernova created in lab For the first time, a massive supernova has been created inside a lab. An international team led by Oxford University scientists used laser beams, 60,000 billion times more powerful than a laser pointer, to recreate scaled supernova explosions in the lab as a way of investigating one of the most energetic events in the universe. Supernova blasts, triggered when fuel in a star reignites or its core collapses, launch a shock wave that sweeps through a few light years from the exploding star in just a few hundred years.

Supernova recreated in lab

Scientists have used laser beams 60,000 billion times more powerful than a laser pointer to recreate scaled supernova explosions in the laboratory to investigate one of the most energetic events in the universe.

Supernova explosions, triggered when the fuel within a star reignites or its core collapses, launch shock waves that sweep through a few light years of space.

“It may sound surprising that a table-top laboratory experiment that fits inside an average room can be used to study astrophysical objects that are light years across,” said Professor Gianluca Gregori of Oxford’s Department of Physics.

“In reality, the laws of physics are the same everywhere, and physical processes can be scaled from one to the other in the same way that waves in a bucket are comparable to waves in the ocean. So our experiments can complement observations of events such as the Cassiopeia A supernova explosion,” said Gregori, who led the study.

The Cassiopeia A supernova explosion was first spotted about 300 years ago in the Cassiopeia constellation 11,000 light years away, its light having taken that long to reach us.

The optical images of the explosion show irregular ‘knotty’ features and associated with these are intense radio and X-ray emissions.

Whilst no one is sure what creates these phenomena one possibility is that the blast passes through a region of space that is filled with dense clumps or clouds of gas.

“Our team began by focusing three laser beams onto a carbon rod target, not much thicker than a strand of hair, in a low density gas-filled chamber,” said Jena Meinecke, an Oxford graduate student who headed the experiment.

The heat generated was more than a few million degrees Celsius and caused the rod to explode. The dense gas clumps that surround an exploding star were simulated by introducing a plastic grid to disturb the shock front.

“The experiment demonstrated that as the blast of the explosion passes through the grid it becomes irregular and turbulent just like the images from Cassiopeia,” said Gregori.

Astra successfully test-fired from Sukhoi

Marking an important milestone, for the first time an Indian missile, Astra, was successfully test-fired from a fighter aircraft — the Sukhoi-30 MKI — from a naval range in the Western Sector on Sunday.

The test-firing met all the mission objectives and the air-launch was captured by side and forward looking high-speed cameras and the separation was exactly as per simulation, according to a press release from the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).

Astra is India's first Beyond Visual Range Air-to-Air missile and has been designed and developed indigenously by the DRDO. The 60-km plus range missile possesses high Single Shot Kill Probability (SSKP) making it highly reliable.

Astra is an all-weather missile with active radar terminal guidance, excellent ECCM (electronic counter-counter measures) features, smokeless propulsion and process improved effectiveness in multi-target scenario, making it a highly advanced state-of-the-art missile, the release added.

Congratulating the team, Avinash Chander, Scientific Advisor to Defence Minister and DG, DRDO, observed that the launch was a major step in missile aircraft integration. He said this would be followed by launch against actual target shortly. “Many more trials are planned and will be conducted to clear the launch envelope. Weapon integration with 'Tejas', Light Combat Aircraft will also be done in the near future”, he added.

V.G. Sekaran, Director-General (Missiles and Strategic Systems), who chaired the Flight Readiness Review Committee, described it as one of the proud moments for DRDO and the entire country. Dr.K. Tamilmani, Director-General (Aeronautics), who oversaw the entire flight safety in the program, said the quality of integration and performance was high standards. This was the beginning of the phase for demonstration of launch over a wide air-launch envelope.

Director, DRDL, S. Som, said “it is a first of its kind and a good achievement”.

Astra's project director, S. Venugopal said the missile was comparable with the best in the world. He said that to completely clear the launch envelope about 20-30 trials would be carried out in a continuous fashion. The air-launch envelope would cover various aspects including altitude, speed and the angle of attack. He said Sunday's test-firing from Su-30 MKI was preceded by several weapon integration trials conducted between November 2013 and February this year. The missile underwent rigorous testing on Su-30 in captive mode for avionics integration and seeker evaluation.

He said the Mk-II variant of Astra with a range of 100 km is planned to be tested by this year end.

He said the air launch was the culmination of effort by a dedicated team from the Missile Complex, Hyderabad, EMILAC (Centre for Military Airworthiness and Certification) and the IAF. HAL carried out modifications in Su-30 along with IAF specialists, while many Indian industries played an important role in the production of reliable avionics, propulsion system, materials, air-frame and software passing stringent airworthiness requirements for the missile.

The “landmark” stem cell paper may be retracted

One of the authors is eager to have the paper withdrawn from the journal

The landmark studies on “stimulus-triggered acquisition of pluripotency” (STAP) published inNature on January 30 this year, which first came under intense scrutiny and severe criticism very soon after their publication, have progressed to their next logical step. Prof. Teruhiko Wakayama from the University of Yamanashi and one of the authors of the studies has openly expressed his eagerness to withdraw the paper from the journal.

The papers by Haruko Obokata from Harvard Medical School and the first author of the papers and others took the world by storm by claiming to have reversed adult mice cells to their pluripotent state by using a very simple process — exposing the cells to mild acidic condition (pH 5.7) for 25 minutes at 37 degree C.
Once reprogrammed, the pluripotent cells (like embryonic stem cells) were capable of becoming any of the adult cells.

In fact, the reprogrammed adult cells were shown to be far superior even to embryonic stem cells. While embryonic stem cells can only contribute to the formation of placental tissue, the STAP cells were found to be capable of contributing to both embryonic and placental tissue formation!

New charge

 A few images published in the paper appear very similar to the ones used in the doctoral thesis of Dr. Obokata has provided evidence of wrongdoing. 

Stimulus-triggered acquisition of pluripotency (also known as STAP) is a claimed phenomenon capable of generating pluripotentstem cells by subjecting ordinary cells to certain types of stress, such as the application of a bacterial toxin, submersion in a weak acid, or physical squeezing.^[1][2] This is a radically simpler method of stem cell generation than previously researched methods as it requires neither nuclear transfer nor the introduction of transcription factors.

A new window into an old world

That cosmic inflation may have happened at a higher-than-anticipated energy means physicists have access to the young universe through astronomical data

On March 17, radio astronomers from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Massachusetts, announced a remarkable discovery. They found evidence of primordial gravitational waves imprinted on the cosmic microwave background (CMB), a field of energy pervading the universe.

A confirmation that these waves exist is the validation of a theory called cosmic inflation. It describes the universe’s behaviour less than one-billionth of a second after it was born in the Big Bang, about 14 billion years ago, when it witnessed a brief but tremendous growth spurt. The residual energy of the Bang is the CMB, and the effect of gravitational waves on it is like the sonorous clang of a bell (the CMB) that was struck powerfully by an effect of cosmic inflation. Thanks to the announcement, now we know the bell was struck.

Remarkable in other ways

The astronomers from the Harvard-Smithsonian used a telescope called BICEP2, situated at the South Pole, to make their observations of the CMB. In turn, BICEP2’s readings of the CMB imply that when cosmic inflation occurred about 14 billion years ago, it happened at a tremendous amount of energy of 10{+1}{+6}GeV (GeV is a unit of energy used in particle physics). Astrophysicists didn’t think it would be so high.

Even the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the world’s most powerful particle accelerator, manages a puny 10{+4}GeV. 

This energy at which inflation has occurred has drawn the attention of physicists studying various issues because here, finally, is a window that allows humankind to naturally study high-energy physics by observing the cosmos. Such a view holds many possibilities, too, from the trivial to the grand.

For example, consider the four naturally occurring fundamental forces: gravitation, strong and weak-nuclear force, and electromagnetic force. Normally, the strong-nuclear, weak-nuclear and electromagnetic forces act at very different energies and distances.

However, as we traverse higher and higher energies, these forces start to behave differently, as they might have in the early universe. This gives physicists probing the fundamental texture of nature an opportunity to explore the forces’ behaviours by studying astronomical data — such as from BICEP2 — instead of relying solely on particle accelerators like the LHC.

 Theories like quantum gravity operate at this level, finding support from frameworks like string theory and loop quantum gravity.

Another perspective on cosmic inflation opens another window. Even though we now know that gravitational waves were sent rippling through the universe by cosmic inflation, we don’t know what caused them. An answer to this question has to come from high-energy physics — a journey that has taken diverse paths over the years.

Consider this: cosmic inflation is an effect associated with quantum field theory, which accommodates the three non-gravitational forces. Gravitational waves are an effect of the theories of relativity, which explain gravity. Because we may now have proof that the two effects are related, we know that quantum mechanics and relativity are also capable of being combined at a fundamental level. This means a theory unifying all the four forces could exist, although that doesn’t mean we’re on the right track.

At present, the Standard Model of particle physics, a paradigm of quantum field theory, is proving to be a mostly valid theory of particle physics, explaining interactions between various fundamental particles. The questions it does not have answers for could be answered by even more comprehensive theories that can use the Standard Model as a springboard to reach for solutions.

Physicists refer to such springboarders as “new physics”— a set of laws and principles capable of answering questions for which “old physics” has no answers; a set of ideas that can make seamless our understanding of nature at different energies.

Supersymmetry

One leading candidate of new physics is a theory called supersymmetry. It is an extension of the Standard Model, especially at higher energies. Finding symptoms of supersymmetry is one of the goals of the LHC, but in over three years of experimentation it has failed. This isn’t the end of the road, however, because supersymmetry holds much promise to solve certain pressing issues in physics which the Standard Model can’t, such as what dark matter is.

Thus, by finding evidence of cosmic inflation at very high energy, radio-astronomers from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center have twanged at one strand of a complex web connecting multiple theories. The help physicists have received from such astronomers is significant and will only mount as we look deeper into our skies

Soon, garbage to power planes

Project Aims To Convert Trash Into Drop-In Fuel For Jets By 2017

London: In a world first, British Airways is planning to use garbage to power its flights in an ambitious project which aims to convert municipal waste into 50,000 metric tonnes of jet fuel per year. 
    The project will attempt to convert trash into a drop-in fuel for air-planes by 2017. While the world’s first factory to turn garbage into jet fuel will come up in about three years, waste-fuelled transatlantic flights could come soon after. 
    Turning garbage into bio-fuel generates twice as much energy as incinerating it for trash, British Airways’ head of environment Jonathan Counsell said. “What we get from that is a very pure, high-quality fuel,” said Counsell. According to Counsell, recent life-cycle analyses indicate that the fuel could reduce greenhouse gas emissions by up to 95% compared to fossil fuels. 
    The airline has partnered with Solena Fuels to build a trash-to-jet fuel conversion facility at a former oil refinery just east of London, ‘ClimateWire’ reported. 
    The facility will take the waste that cities already collect and turn it into fuel. Once the waste has been cleaned of any hazardous or recyclable materials, it will be combusted in a low-oxygen environment that produces a synthesis gas of hydrogen and carbon monoxide, a process known as gasification. 
    The gas will then be converted to liquid fuel, in a process called Fischer-Tropsch, the report said. 
    Fuelling the London to New York trips with bio-fuel would displace about 2% of the airlines’ consumption at its main hub — Heathrow Airport outside of London. However, British Airways expects to increase its use gradually, in compliance with a United Kingdom aviation industry road map that sets the goal of obtaining 30% of fuels from renewable sources by 2050. AGENCIES

GREEN FLIGHT: British Airways is planning the world’s first factory to turn garbage into jet fuel that is expected to come up in about three years, followed by waste-fuelled transatlantic flights

What ails Indian science?

“Getting funding [for research] is easy in India,” said Dr. Mathai Joseph “because there is no competition here. Money is not scarce [though R&D spending is less than 1 per cent of GDP]. But money comes with the same bureaucratic restrictions that apply to all government expenditure.” Dr. Joseph is a computer scientist and a consultant, and was earlier a senior research scientist at TIFR, Mumbai. For instance, while research students get no funding support to travel abroad to participate in conferences, scientists are constrained by “limited foreign travel.”

These restrictions on foreign travel prevent students and scientists from gaining in terms of networking, exchanging ideas and being exposed to the kind of work being done by their peers in other countries. “Science does not happen like that — by not allowing them to travel abroad,” he said.

The big mistake

But the systematic undermining of scientific enterprise started way back in the mid 1950s. According to an opinion piece published today (April 3) in Nature , (Dr. Joseph is the first author), the Department of Atomic Energy, which was created as a different model, had Homi Bhabha, the head of DAE as a “secretary to the government.” The mistake was repeated when the DAE model was replicated in other institutions — space and biotechnology, to name a few.

“The fact that scientific departments are modelled on the rest of the bureaucracy has turned out to be a big mistake,” Dr. Joseph said. “That’s because bureaucracy is not designed to encourage innovation. DAE and the department of space are the only institutions that undertake developments in-house. Others like the DBT [Department of Biotechnology] do not.” Contrast this with the system followed in the developed countries. For instance, in the case of the U.S., the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) are outside the government bureaucracy.

By being a part of the bureaucracy, even those scientists in India who do remarkable research cannot be rewarded with promotion or pay hike. “If you reward scientific achievement rather than years of service, scientists would be motivated to take up novel scientific challenges,” he noted. Regrettably, the malaise of promotion based on years of service, and not by achievement has spread to institutions at the national level too.

“Indian science has for too long been hamstrung by bureaucratic mentality that values administrative power over scientific achievements,” the paper notes.

It is, however, pertinent to note that the department of space stands out from the rest. Younger people have been put in charge of important programmes, and they have succeeded. “This system is quite old in the department of space,” Dr. Joseph said.

The golden era

These essentially explain why prior to the 1950s important contributions from people like Jagadish Chandra Bose, Satyendra Nath Bose and Srinivasa Ramanujan came from within the country. The pioneering work by these people came before “the machinery of government took over and mismanaged research.”

Another problem is the lack of lateral movement from one institution to another. While collaborating with scientists from other institutions would go a long way in putting to test the usefulness of one’s expertise without actually moving to another institution, one ends up gaining more by moving out. “Vitality grows from being challenged in scientific terms [when one moves from one institution to another],” Dr. Joseph said.

Collaboration

Incidentally, even collaborating with scientists from other institutions is rarely seen in India. Worse, even the funding agencies do not insist on this. Funding is rather provided for collaboration within the institution than across institutions. This is true even in the case of the Nano mission launched in 2007.

According to the authors, the Nano mission has funded 150 individual projects, 11 centres of excellence and six industry-linked projects. “But [the mission] has required no collaboration between institutions,” the paper notes.

“There are very few national frameworks for collaboration,” he said, “working towards a common goal is missing.” Collaboration becomes all the more important as the size of the groups in any area is small in India.

It is true that there is an inherent resistance to collaboration across institutions in other countries as well. “But programmes like ESPRIT [European Strategic Programme on Research in Information Technology] insist on collaboration across institutions and countries for funding,” he said.

According to the paper, one of the four changes that need to be urgently initiated to reinvigorate research is to decouple funding and government control. “Indian science needs public funding, but not government control,” the paper notes. There are numerous examples in other countries and in Europe where such a system has been operating successfully.

The tenure of heads of institutions should also be limited and they should be encouraged to return to active research. “The rotation should be every five years. It’s very hard to do research when you head an institution,” he said, “you can’t do research full time.”

‘Heartbleed bug’ puts web security at risk

Virus In Protocols Used By 75% Of Servers Leaves Millions Vulnerable To Data Theft

Javed Anwer TNN 

    Aserious bug in security protocols used by over 75% web servers has left millions of internet users vulnerable to snooping and data theft. The bug, which was found in OpenSSL protocol has been dubbed Heartbleed because of how it allows “bleeding of data” from a web server. 
    Cyber criminals and hackers can exploit the bug to steal information such as private encryption keys, passwords of users, credit card details that users provide during e-commerce transactions and virtually every other piece of data transmitting on the affected website. They can also capture user data like chat logs for snooping. 
    The risk to private encryption keys is particularly worrisome. “These are the crown jewels… Leaked (private) secret keys allow the attacker to decrypt any past and future traffic to the protected services and to impersonate the service (like a social networking website or an email service) at will,” OpenSSL explained a website set up to inform public about Heartbleed. 
    While large companies like Google and Facebook, which run their own customized security protocols, are probably safe, Yahoo was among the millions of websites that seem to have been affected. Yahoo officials on Tuesday said that they have taken required measures to secure Yahoo servers against Heartbleed. 
    The bug is so serious and widespread that Tor Project, which manages the anonymous (and popular) Tor network, has advised web users to go offline for a while. “If you need strong anonymity or privacy on the internet, you might want to stay away from the internet entirely for the next few days while things settle,” it said in a blog post. 
    Bruce Schneier, a cryptographer and one of the top computer security researchers, called the bug catastrophic. “On the scale of 1 to 10, this is an 11,” he said. 
    Though Heartbleed was discovered on April 7, it had existed for more than two years. “This bug has left large amount of private keys and other secrets exposed to the internet. Considering the long exposure, ease of exploitation and attacks leaving no trace this exposure should be taken seriously,” explained the Heartbleed website. 
    After the bug was disclosed publicly, thousands of websites have patched and updated their web servers. But given the nature of the bug, large parts of the internet remain vulnerable. 
    While Heartbleed directly affects web servers, the average web user invariably ends up a victim. In an answer to a question — Am I affected by the bug? — the OpenSSL website notes, “you are likely to be affected either directly or indirectly”. “Your popular social site, your company’s site, commerce site, hobby site, site you install software from or even sites run by your government might be using vulnerable OpenSSL. Many of online services use TLS to both to identify themselves to you and to protect your privacy and transactions,” notes the website.
LURKING DANGER 
WHAT IS HEARTBLEED? It is a two-year-old security bug in OpenSSL protocols used by over 70% websites. It is called Heartbleed because it leads to ‘bleeding of data’ from affected servers 
WHAT IS OPENSSL? 
    OpenSSL is a security protocol 
    built using SSL/TLS encryption. 
    Any website that has “https” or a small green lock ahead of its name uses SSL/TLS encryption. For example when you type your login name and password on your bank’s website and hit enter, it uses a secure channel to transfer your details to the website server. This channel is encrypted by SSL/TLS. OpenSSL is one of the most popular and widely used implementation of SSL/TLS 
HOW HEARTBLEED AFFECTS YOU If the website that you use has been exploited by cyber criminals using Heartbleed, yourprivate data is at risk. In case of a banking website, it could be card and account details. In case of email website, your user name and password is at risk. In case of chat service, your chat logs are vulnerable 
WHAT CAN YOU DO ABOUT IT Web servers have to be patched or updated to fix Heartbleed. This is something website administrators will have to do. But as a user you can ask your bank, email provider, web administrator whether their service is affected by the bug or not. Also, if you can change your passwords on various websites, do that

World’s largest swarm of genetically modified mosquitoes released in Brazil

The world’s largest-ever swarm of genetically modified mosquitoes has been released in Brazil to combat infectious disease, according to reports.

Jacobina, a farming town in Bahia, has been plagued for years by dengue fever, a mosquito-borne tropical disease and a leading cause of illness and fatality in Brazil.

According to the Global Post , the newly-hatched Aedes aegypti mosquitoes have been engineered to wipe out their own species, The Independent reported.

Last year, Brazil reported 1.4 million cases of dengue, for which there is no vaccine — the most severe form of the illness, dengue hemorrhagic fever, can lead to shock, coma and death.

The so-called ‘Franken—skeeter’ has been genetically modified in a laboratory with a gene designed to devastate the non-GM Aedes aegypti population and reduce dengue’s spread.

The mosquitoes contain a lethal gene but are kept alive in the laboratory with the help of the antibiotic tetracycline. Once they reach larval stage, the males are separated from the females, which are subsequently destroyed.

Then the males, which don’t bite, are released so they can mate with wild females. Their offspring inherit the lethal gene and then die before they can reproduce because they are not treated with tetracycline.

India to conduct complex interceptor missile test

In another fortnight, India will be conducting one of the most complex interceptor missile tests. For the first time a state-of-the-art interceptor missile at supersonic speed will seek to engage and destroy an incoming target missile at a very high altitude of 120-140 km over the Bay of Bengal.

For the first time, the interceptor missile (PDV) would be seeking to destroy the separating payload of the target missile (a modified PAD) after discriminating between the booster and the payload.

Describing it as a “big challenge,” they said the interceptor’s “kill vehicle,” equipped with a dual seeker, would attack the payload (warhead portion) as it descends towards its intended target. 

The advantage of intercepting an incoming missile at such a high altitude was that the debris would not fall on the ground and there would be no collateral damage.

From detection to interception, the entire exercise would be fully automated and there would be no human intervention. 

The kill vehicle of the interceptor, equipped with an attitude control mechanism, would hurtle towards the target’s missile payload at a speed of 1500 metres per second as it seeks to engage and destroy it.

After some more trials, India plans to deploy a two-tiered Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) system to protect important cities from external threats. 

In the first phase, incoming enemy missiles of 2,000-km range are envisaged to be waylaid and destroyed, while those with about 5,000-km range would be tackled by the interceptors in the second phase.

So far, six of the seven interceptor missile tests, carried out by the DRDO, have been successful. While two interceptions were conducted in exo-atmopshere (altitudes between 47 and 80 km) the rest were in endo-atmosphere (below 40 km altitude).

To heat eco-city, Turkey looks to ‘green gold’

Pistachios are already a key ingredient in Turkish baklava, but the country may now have found a new way to exploit the nuts known as “green gold” — by using their shells to heat a new eco-city.

Officials are currently examining plans to build the country’s first ecological city with buildings both private and public heated by burning pistachio shells.

And there can be few better locations for such a project than Gaziantep — the south-eastern region close to the Syrian border which produces thousands of tonnes of the nut every year.

“Gaziantep’s potential in pistachio production is known, as well as its considerable amount of pistachio shells waste,” said Ms. Seda Müftüõglu Güleç, a green building expert for the municipality.

“We are planning to obtain biogas, a kind of renewable energy, from burning pistachio shells,” she said.

“We thought the ecological city could be heated by burning pistachio shells because when you plan such environment-friendly systems, you take a look at natural resources you have,” she said.

“If the region was abundant in wind power, we would utilise wind energy,” she added.

Feasible energy source

The pistachio-heated new city would encompass 3,200 hectares, and house 200,000 people. It would be located 11 kilometres (six miles) from the province’s capital city, also named Gaziantep.

“Imagine it just like a separate city,” Ms. Güleç said.

If the project bears fruit, pistachio shells formerly regarded as waste could become a new form of energy.

Turkey is one of the world’s biggest producers of pistachios, along with Iran, the United States and Syria, according to the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization.

Last year, it exported 6,800 tonnes of the nut, generating approximately $80 million (€57 million) in income, up from 4,010 tonnes and $50 million in 2010, according to the Southeast Anatolia Exporters Union.

Gaziantep alone exported 4,000 tonnes last year, Mr. Mehmet Kahraman, from the union said.

A pilot project first

A pilot project for the new city will run in a small 55-hectare area, before rolling out across the entire city if successful.

The potential of pistachio shells was first uncovered by French environmental engineering company Burgeap which reported last year that the local variety known as Antep was the most feasible source of energy in the region. It said that Antep pistachio shells — with its 19.26 calorific value per kilo — are the most feasible local energy source in the province and that it would be enough to provide heating and cooling for 55 hectares of public buildings.

Burgeap said as much as 60 per cent of the area’s heating could be met from renewable energy resources.

The project is still pending approval from local authorities.

While Ms. Güleç declined to provide a firm timeline, she said that if officials at the municipal level reach an agreement — and if private land owners are convinced — it will be implemented in a “very short period of time.”

 

Brightening Moon to save electricity?

A Sweden-based cosmetics company has proposed a bizarre new method to eliminate the need for streetlights - brighten the surface of the Moon. The idea is to use materials already on the Moon to lighten its surface. The goal is to reflect slightly more sunlight onto Earth, making the night sky brighter, according to the company's thinktank, Foreo Institute.

A brighter night sky would mean less need for streetlights, which could potentially translate into less electricity usage and thus fewer globe warming carbon emissions, it said. "We want to raise public awareness about the project and generate consciousness about the global energy crisis," said Paul Peros, CEO of Foreo. The proposal has a hint of a "marketing scheme" to it, but precisely why the cosmetics company came up with this idea remains unclear, LiveScience reported.

When asked, a company representative told the website that Foreo is an "innovation company" that engages with experts from diverse fields. However, scientists are sceptical about the idea. "Making the Moon brighter is not something I've ever heard of in geoengineering literature," said Ben Kravitz, a postdoctoral researcher in the atmospheric sciences and global change division of Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.

Foreo's claims to have raised $52 million for research and testing and a timeline on the company's website says its first Moon mission is slated for 2020 with new rovers deploying every three years. According to Foreo, only about 0.1% of the Moon's surface would need to be transformed to reach 80% of the "desired brightening effect".

Peros said the company is looking into smoothing over a portion of the Moon's surface to increase reflectivity. "We are looking at the surfaces and composition of the soil and materials on the Moon and how to utilize them," he said. Even if such a mission were successful, it could have side effects. Light at night can disrupt sleep and has been linked to increases in several types of cancer. Foreo says the brightening effect would happen over 30 years, allowing humans time to adjust. agencies










































 

maldives

Majority mandate for Maldives ruling coalition

Maldives President Abdulla Yameen’s party, with the help of its coalition partners, has attained majority in parliament in elections held over the weekend, an official said here Sunday.

The Maldivian parliamentary elections, which were held amidst the controversial removal of the head and deputy of the country’s Elections Commission, concluded largely peacefully Saturday.

Vote counting gave the opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP), led by former president Mohammad Nasheed, who was controversially ousted from power in 2012, a slim lead initially but it was soon overtaken by Yameen’s Progressive Party of Maldives (PPM), Xinhua reported.

Of the 85 constituencies, 34 seats were won by PPM while its coalition partners Jumhoory Party (JP) bagged 15 seats and the Maldives Development Alliance (MDA) five seats. Nasheed’s MDP secured only 24 seats and lost its majority in parliament.

There are also five independent seats up for grabs.

“A total of 75 complaints were submitted to the Elections Commission. These include three complaints about the voters’ names not being on the list, five about anti—campaigning and four complaints regarding bribery,” Elections Commission member Mohammad Manik told reporters. Yet this was lower than the number of complaints received during the presidential election last year, Manik said

Gayoom comes back, in style

Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, who ruled the Maldives with an iron hand for three decades before giving way to more democratic forces, is back. The party he founded, the Progressive Party of Maldives, has emerged as the single largest party in a surprisingly trouble-free parliamentary election in the Maldives on March 22. More important, the PPM and its allies have won a nearly two-thirds majority in the 85-member People’s Majlis, the Maldives’ Parliament. The PPM on its own has 34 seats; the Jumhooree Party, run by a business tycoon, won 15 seats, and the Maldives Development Alliance managed five. The Maldivian Democratic Party, whose nominee, Mohamed Nasheed, was elected President in the first multi-party elections in 2008, lost its numbers in Parliament, winning just 24 seats. Islamists have got representation in the Majlis with the Aadalath Party’s lone success. The elections were held even as the head and deputy of the country’s Elections Commission (EC) were removed by the Supreme Court. Ahead of the polls, there were widespread complaints of distribution of money and goods. With no firm law in place, and being virtually headless, the EC looked the other way, and went ahead with the polls. Transparency Maldives, which monitored the polls, said the process was well administered and transparent but that wider issues of money politics threaten the democratic process.

This result leaves the PPM now at the helm in both the legislature and the executive, and with Gayoom-era judges heading the Supreme Court, democracy in the Maldives has come full circle. For Mr. Gayoom’s half-brother, Abdulla Yameen, who won the presidency in the 2013 elections, the victory means freedom to put his agenda into action. During his campaign, Mr. Yameen, an economist, had asserted that turning the country around would be his first task. Ever since February 2012, after Mr. Nasheed stepped down in controversial circumstances, the Maldives has slipped from one crisis to another. The economy has hit the lowest level in decades, and many multinationals insist on payment in U.S. dollars for any transaction. Mr. Yameen presides over a mammoth government: the number of Ministers in the Maldives is only marginally less than in Sri Lanka — which has the largest number of Ministers in this region. Public confidence in institutions and government is at an all-time low. Also, though Mr. Yameen made his first foreign visit to India, there is a discernible confidence gap between the two countries. India is critical to sustaining the Maldivian economy and Mr. Yameen is aware of this. In addition to managing relations with India, he needs to carry all sections with him and work to improve governance.

sedition law and controversy

The perils of blatant secessionism

It has been a common sight in Kashmir Valley since the ’90s: thousands of people accompanying the body of a terrorist killed in an encounter with security forces. Women wail and beat their chests, men shout pro-freedom slogans. Candy and coins are thrown over the bier. Many such dead terrorists happen to be foreigners, especially Pakistani nationals. In the last few years, though, the number of mourners has dwindled. Instead of thousands, the crowd now runs into hundreds.

Thousands or hundreds, but grieving over the body of an intruder is what the rest of India sees the next day on its newspapers. This is what an old man in Meerut, whose son might be in the Army and involved in counter-insurgency operations in Kashmir, sees on his TV screen. That is the impression he has of Kashmir. What he won’t see, as a journalist friend from Kashmir says, is the number of people in villages and towns across Kashmir who silently pass on information about terrorist movement in their area, enabling security forces to eliminate them. Those details will remain buried in some file in an army garrison somewhere.

Entrenched stereotypes

For an average Indian, a Kashmiri was the quintessential shawl seller who would come visiting their colony in winters, claiming that his products were the best and the cheapest. “This is pure Pashmina,” he would tell them. Sometimes it wouldn’t turn out to be so. They would then curse him and call him a swindler. But that was all right. The average Indian was used to getting swindled by many others. Feeling swindled is a national sentiment, and the ability to swindle our national pride. In this we were always one — from Kashmir to Kanyakumari. When a couple from Indore went to Kashmir for their honeymoon, the husband would sometimes feel they were being overcharged for a shikara ride. It would also leave them perturbed when a pony handler in Gulmarg asked them whether they were from “Hindustan.” But they would forget it soon afterwards; they would get busy with getting pictures clicked in traditional Kashmiri attire.

But how does a “Hindustani” reconcile with the news of a bunch of Kashmiri boys studying in an institute named after Swami Vivekananda, cheering on the Pakistani cricket team during an India-Pakistan match and then shouting pro-Pakistan slogans? Someone in the Uttar Pradesh police went overboard to the extent of booking the boys on charges of sedition — especially when, in neighbouring Muzaffarnagar, rapists and arsonists named by their victims are roaming free.

But how would an institute that admitted about 150 Kashmiri students have acted differently than suspending students whose sloganeering led to violence? According to the private university’s vice-chancellor Manzoor Ahmed, there was strong resentment against the Kashmiri students who shouted “anti-national and pro-Pakistan slogans.” Should he have waited for the situation to become worse which in turn might have resulted in more serious violence, even death?

We cannot take cricket rivalry seriously given that India and Pakistan have far more crucial issues to tackle. After the Meerut incident, many have said that cheering a particular cricket team or a player playing against one’s country is no big deal. They are right. It is not. It is all right, during an India-England match, to cheer for Alistair Cook, for example. But to then go on and shout “Hail Queen Victoria!” — well, that would be outright silly, or depending on who you perform this stunt in front of, outrageous. It is also true that in matters like these, India or Indians should act in a more mature manner. After all, like a friend commented on twitter, Britain ignores its nationals of Indian or Pakistani origin when they cheer for their country of origin during a cricket match. That is how developed nations are supposed to behave. But imagine during the 2011 Cricket World Cup, in which Ireland’s Kevin O’ Brien smashed a century just off 50 balls to lead his country to a spectacular victory against England, someone getting up next to a Briton from Bishopgate and shouting: “Long live Gerry Adams!”

This is one lesson Kashmiris ought to learn quickly. Their anger against the Indian state is legitimate. But shouting pro-Pakistan slogans in Meerut is not going to alter New Delhi’s Kashmir policy in any way. The best chance Kashmiris have for redressing their grievances is to take along the ‘aam aadmi’ in the rest of India. The old man in Meerut should rather know the humiliation of sitting on one’s haunches the whole day during an Army crackdown. He should know how passports are being denied to young men and women because in the ’70s, their grandfathers believed in a particular ideology. He should know what it is to be caught in the middle of a stone-pelting episode and getting hit in the eye by a pellet.

Rippling effect

Kashmiris should not give a chance to rogue elements in Indian security agencies to justify false implication of scores of innocent Kashmiri youth in cases of terrorism. But sadly, that is exactly what will happen in the wake of paranoia created after incidents such as the one in Meerut. The ripples of Meerut are already being felt in other parts. More Kashmiris are going to find it difficult to find landlords willing to take them as tenants. There will be companies reluctant to hire them; there will be institutes reluctant to grant them admission.

India ought to create a lot more opportunities for young Kashmiris to make them stakeholders in her success. But young Kashmiris must also come forward and participate in the Indian story. Many Kashmiris have. One just needs to look around. But there is still a vast enabling space available for many more.

The rise of Islamist extremism in Kashmir was followed by the rise of the militant right in India. In the early ’90s, when L.K. Advani decided to march to Srinagar to unfurl the Indian national flag, the student wing of his party created a slogan: “ Doodh maangoge to kheer denge , Kashmir maangoge to cheer denge” (Ask for milk, we’ll give you milk pudding; ask for Kashmir, we will rip you apart). That slogan turned into an overarching sentiment for the average Indian; it became the whole essence of patriotism.

That idea still holds. That is why even a radical political party like the Aam Aadmi Party tends to tread cautiously on matters relating to Kashmir lest it gives an idea to its supporters that it is anti-national.

It would augur well for Kashmiris if they start asking not for milk but a share of their milk pudding. Maybe when they do, there will be no need to demand Kashmir.

Abuse of sedition law

Cricket between India and Pakistan indeed incites great passion in both countries, and among the followers of the two teams patriotism often gets unduly mixed with the love for the game. However, for its sheer perversity and unreason, the action of the Meerut police in booking a group of students from Jammu and Kashmir on a charge of sedition beats all previous instances of the misuse of the penal provision. The ostensible ‘crime’ committed by the students seems to be that they cheered for the Pakistan cricket team during a closely fought one-day match against India and celebrated Pakistan’s victory. The charge of sedition under Section 124A of the Indian Penal Code has been dropped, but only after the strong outrage evoked by this irrational act. Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah appealed to his counterpart in Uttar Pradesh, Akhilesh Yadav, and described the invocation of grave offences unacceptably harsh. The only small comfort is that no student has yet been named in the first information report even though the charges of promoting enmity between different groups, under Section 153-A of the IPC and causing mischief (Section 427), remain. The Swami Vivekanand Subharti University, a private institution in Meerut, says it sent back Kashmiri students from the hostel where the incident took place as a precautionary measure to prevent the incident from being given a communal colour. While the University authorities claim they had not lodged a complaint, the district’s Senior Superintendent of Police says the police acted only on a complaint from its Registrar.

The reckless invoking of the grave charge of sedition for minor expressions of views that may be contrary to conventional notions of patriotism is an unacceptable affront to India’s democracy. The Supreme Court has made it clear that it cannot be invoked unless there is actual incitement to violence and intention to cause disorder, and that merely using words that indicate disaffection against the government cannot be termed sedition. The police officers who included Section 124A in the FIR appear to have no understanding of this aspect of the law. Nor did they take into account the adverse effect such a measure would have on the psyche of students and others from Kashmir residing or working elsewhere in the country. It was only recently that the Jammu and Kashmir cricket team was subjected to a midnight search of hotel rooms on the eve of a Ranji Trophy match in Jammu. The Uttar Pradesh government should take quick steps to drop the case and bring back the Kashmiri students to the same campus and let them resume their studies. Otherwise, this will be another ugly episode that will intensify the alienation of Kashmiris from the Indian mainstream.

Words that wound

Responding to a public interest petition that sought curbs on hate speech in Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh, the Supreme Court has asked the Centre’s legal experts to identify exactly what qualified as such. While the Constitution places reasonable restrictions on free speech, and sections of the penal code and the CrPC forbid words, written or spoken, that promote ill-will between religious, racial, linguistic, regional, caste groups or communities, there is no specific detail in any statute on what kind of speech crosses the line.

This attempt to bound the limits of hate speech is significant. Earlier, on March 3, the court had refused to order the Election Commission to restrict hate speech, saying that 128 crore people could have 128 crore views, and that “all shades of opinion” should be made available to the public, who could then make up their own minds.

Speech can have violent, tragic effects, and hate speech legislation exists in most free societies, including the UK, Canada, Germany, Denmark and Australia. The US is an exception, in the belief that even the most despicable views should not be silenced, with very narrow exceptions like slander, child pornography and so on. But even in the US, many legal scholars have argued that hate speech poses great harm to the lives, dignity and reputation of minority groups.

Given how diverse and unequal India is, laws that prohibit abuse and psychological undermining of vulnerable groups are certainly necessary — but the problem is that these laws are used to suppress any unwelcome opinion, criticism, even scholarship and humour. Rather than controlling incitement or intimidation, they have created a climate of self-censorship and made it difficult to suggest that some words, no matter how obnoxious, should be countered with other words.

Instead of understanding that hate speech is most condemnable when there is a power differential and when it threatens social inclusion, these laws have chilled free

In such a context, the Supreme Court’s refusal to come down heavily on political speech and its belief in the maturity of the public is a refreshing change. It is right to ask the Law Commission to define hate speech more tightly and to reduce arbitrariness in the way it is applied.

Words that wound

Responding to a public interest petition that sought curbs on hate speech in Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh, the Supreme Court has asked the Centre’s legal experts to identify exactly what qualified as such. While the Constitution places reasonable restrictions on free speech, and sections of the penal code and the CrPC forbid words, written or spoken, that promote ill-will between religious, racial, linguistic, regional, caste groups or communities, there is no specific detail in any statute on what kind of speech crosses the line.

This attempt to bound the limits of hate speech is significant. Earlier, on March 3, the court had refused to order the Election Commission to restrict hate speech, saying that 128 crore people could have 128 crore views, and that “all shades of opinion” should be made available to the public, who could then make up their own minds.

Speech can have violent, tragic effects, and hate speech legislation exists in most free societies, including the UK, Canada, Germany, Denmark and Australia. The US is an exception, in the belief that even the most despicable views should not be silenced, with very narrow exceptions like slander, child pornography and so on. But even in the US, many legal scholars have argued that hate speech poses great harm to the lives, dignity and reputation of minority groups.

Given how diverse and unequal India is, laws that prohibit abuse and psychological undermining of vulnerable groups are certainly necessary — but the problem is that these laws are used to suppress any unwelcome opinion, criticism, even scholarship and humour. Rather than controlling incitement or intimidation, they have created a climate of self-censorship and made it difficult to suggest that some words, no matter how obnoxious, should be countered with other words.

Instead of understanding that hate speech is most condemnable when there is a power differential and when it threatens social inclusion, these laws have chilled free

In such a context, the Supreme Court’s refusal to come down heavily on political speech and its belief in the maturity of the public is a refreshing change. It is right to ask the Law Commission to define hate speech more tightly and to reduce arbitrariness in the way it is applied.