Firstly, the Indian government has released a cache of police and crime statistics, for which they should be commended. This is an infographic detailing complaints against the police and what happens to them. Basically, most are rejected, more are processed internally, and a fraction make it to court. Of those that make it, only a sliver ever make it out.

I just read that 29% of MPs in India have criminal charges. Some have been convicted once, but in India you can keep serving as long as the case is under appeal. Sri Lanka doesn’t have similar RTI or disclosure laws, but off the top of my head I can name one Minister charged with murder in India (Douglas Devananda) and one that should be charged for a recent shoot out (Duminda Silva).

I’m no monkey for copyright. This video amply describes how corrupted that system has become. Credit, however, is simply polite and helps people find their way around. In mainstream Sri Lankan media it’s completely cool to copy/paste from the net and link either not at all or with Source: Internet. Which is not useful. At all.

Wrote something for the Indian site MyLaw.net on grease devils. Everybody spins the story their own way. Being a panic, it’s of course prone to multiple interpretations. My point here is that people don’t trust the police or even army that much, so this shows the underlying fragility of law and order, and the cost in terms of survival of the state.

Anna Hazare is calling off his anti-corruption fast after the Indian Parliament agreed to some of his demands. I shan’t get into his demands or the response too deeply, the NYTimes link before or this Hindu link should help with that. The broader question is, what is democracy? Is it representative or deliberative? Are laws the domain of a Parliament or of the people?

Today, President Mahinda Rajapaksa announced that Sri Lanka will not renew Emergency Regulations. So, phew, everybody can relax now. Emergency Law gave ‘extensive arrest and detention powers to authorities over citizens [and presumably, yakas]‘. So, now they need warrants and stuff. Except, of course, ‘Sri Lanka also has another law, the Prevention of Terrorism Act, which gives extensive powers to law enforcement authorities over citizens’ (LBO). So, uh, yeah.

Sri Lanka has been under Emergency Law on and off for what seems like my entire lifetime (I was born in 1982). The Prevention Of Terrorism Act (readable 1981 version) is our Emergency Law. It basically makes warrantless search and seizure OK and detention possible because the government says so.

Not by grease yakas (grease devils that sparked mass hysteria) but the Women and Media Collective has organized a group of men and women from affected areas to share their experiences. It’ll be at the Hotel Renuka at 3 PM today. I can’t make it, but if someone else goes, please let me knows.

Professor Ratnajeevan Hoole once had to flee Sri Lanka because he spoke out against the LTTE. Now he’s left again, this time because he spoke out against Douglas Devananda and the EPDP. What does that tell you about the EPDP, and the government’s support for them? “This time he had to leave, he said, because of his differences with the lone Tamil Minister in Sri Lankan Cabinet, Douglas Devananda.”

Sri Lanka is a country of about 20 million people which has barely been under central control, ever. Post-independence, first the south broke off, then the north. Both were bloodily pasted back on. The 13th amendment has devolution in it, which was never implemented. Will the government implement it now? Nope. They have neither the ability nor the inclination to create local institutions. But the provinces can.