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Showing posts from November 2, 2007

Barrackpore: the cradle of the quake

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The Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 was one of the most remarkable events that took place in British India, especially during the rule of the East India Company. It indeed was the first mass uprising against the foreign rule in the country. Historians may have doubts and conflicts regarding the nature of the revolt and the reasons behind its failure, but it cannot be denied that the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 actually marked the beginning of a new era in Indian history. It was the strongest reason behind the end of the Company’s rule and the transfer of power to the British throne, which happened in the subsequent year. Various factors however are accounted for the instigation to the revolt. Lord Dalhousie’s policies of annexation of the native states and an ever-increasing discontent among the sepoys, the Indian soldiers appointed by the East India Company, are believed to be two of the most important factors behind the outbreak of the mutiny. Other subsidiary reasons like introduction of western edu...

A Ray of Hope: prison children of Jharkhand

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On a usually relaxed March morning at the Ranchi Zoo the visitors suddenly got to see an unusually enthusiastic crowd of juveniles, cheering at every animal, and more unusually, at even the most ordinary of snacks, like peanuts and corns. They did not look like the normal excursion teams from schools. Neither did they look like destitute orphans from remote homes. They looked like as if from some different world… Thy actually were children from a different world. A mundane, melancholy world that survives in absolute seclusion. They were children of the inmates imprisoned in the jails of Jharkhand. These children have been refused refuge everywhere else, and have no other option but to live in the jails with either of their parents, or both. Some of them were even born inside the jails, and have been spending their childhood ever since in a way most of us would be terrified even to imagine about ourselves, or our own children. But, as a matter of fact, the only difference between them a...