Letters to the Editor

'Modi job do' hashtag

'Modi_job_do' hashtag has become the global hashtag used by students and educated but unemployed people in India. They are demanding fair and timely job recruitment process, timely exam and results, increase vacancies and reform in exams. To the surprise, this hashtag is trending at No.1 on Twitter. The rising of unemployment crisis of the country is reflected through this hashtag.

Before the COVID-19 pandemic hit India, we were already passing through the highest unemployment of last 45 years. Again the pandemic took the nation in a very difficult situation with private companies laying off employees, labourers left with no work and government delaying recruitment processes for various departments. Only 400 million people are employed after the pandemic. As the election proceeds, the political members are busy in campaigning on the one hand, and on the other, the unemployed members of the country are feeling helpless and frustrated. This is a long term problem of the country and can be termed as a 'Traditional Problem'. But, this time the unemployment rate has crossed all the limits.

Hence, the unemployment crisis has become a serious social and economic issue of the country and can cause a ripple effect. The Modi government needs to take several steps to fix India's job crisis and save India's unemployment rate to go from the bad to worst situation.

Jyotirmoy Sarma,

Guwahati

Assembly election

The election to the Assam Assembly will be held on March 27, April 1 and April 6 of 2021. As such, various political parties participating in the Assam Assembly polls will campaign to secure votes. Every political party releases its manifesto before the election to let voters know their policy matters, besides promises and assurances. The indigenous people in Assam are against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) and they want the government not to implement it in the State. The BJP government at the Centre wants to implement the Act in the country as a whole. It's crystal clear that if the Centre implements the CAA in Assam, the indigenous people will be reduced to minority on their own land, and this will have its cascading effect on the local populace. All parties that support the CAA shouldn't expect votes from the indigenous people of the State.

Maheswar Deka,

Rangia

Totally unbiased

Perhaps there are a limited number of media houses which are truly maintaining the ethics of journalism. The Sentinel is certainly one among the limited ones. Today's most of the news channels or the print media are owned by politicians or businessmen or sadly sold to one or the other political party. I am subscriber of your esteemed daily for the last one year and I have found your daily to be totally unbiased or shall we say neutral. The 'Letters to The Editor' section is very vibrant with people expressing their views/opinions freely without any restrictions. Just as I mentioned above that majority of the media houses are either pro-government or anti-government but in this column people are at liberty to call black a black and white a white. Apart from that the contents of the column is very informative as letters are on wide subjects with proper reasoning.

Dhiman Senchowa,

North Lakhimpur.

UN body slams India

It is reported in the media that the United Nations' (UN) Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (WGAD) has slammed India for the 27-month illegal detention of the British businessman Chritian Michel without prosecution. This body works under the UN Commission for Human Rights. It has, further, asked the Indian government to immediately release him, and pay compensation as per International Law. The group also noted that India has violated the International Declaration of Human Rights, and the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights.

WGAD has also ruled that Michel was illegally arrested by the UAE authorities and handed over to India.

The group has noted that Michel was forced to sign a preposterous confession under duress, by the CBI, stating that he paid bribes to the Gandhi family of the Congress party to procure an order of Augusta Westland VVIP Helicopter deal when the UPA was in the Government. WGAD's order has almost upheld Michel's innocence.

This must be a great setback for India, as also its image in the International arena. To be sure, Michel is a British citizen, which Prime Minister was invited by the Union Government, as the Guest of Honour, for the Republic Day function this year.

D Bhutia,

RGB Road, Guwahati

Good job by government

Sprint Queen Hima Das is honoured with the cap of DSP in the Assam Police by the State government. Kudos to Sarbananda Sonowal for this decision. Hima Das brought laurels for the country in that event where level of competition is the highest. It is not every day that India produces a champion in Track and Field event and what Hima Das has achieved in her short career is amazing. Winning gold medal in Asian Games is a real challenge. Honouring sportspersons who have excelled in their field will motivate the upcoming generations. I through your column congratulate Hima Das on her achievement and pray to Almighty for more success for her and also I offer my sincere appreciation to Chief Minister Sorbanananda Sonowal for encouraging sportspersons.

Pratap Dutta,

Tezpur.

What AJYCP is

One of the many youth and students' organizations active in the State is the AJYCP. Like the AASU, majority of its cadres or members are over-aged to be called students. In line with the AASU, the AJYCP's foremost agenda is to work for students' welfare, but we see its members indulging in road blockades, tyre burning, sit-in demonstrations or waving black flags causing hardship to the general public. If one recalls the role and activeness shown by the members of the AJYCP during the pandemic time last year we would be surprised to find that they went to hibernation. The poor people faced the hardest of time during the COVID pandemic but no relief and awareness drive was noticed from the organization.

There are other vital issues concerning the Congress and the AIUDF alliance, and hobnobbing by MP Ajit Bhuyan. However, the AJYCP is maintaining a deafening silence on such issues. These are very fresh in people's mind.

Joel Goyari

Tangla

Second wave of COVID

It is the casual attitude of people post-lockdown that is responsible for the reemergence of the corona strain in some parts of the world. With new mutant variants of the virus reported in several states, it is vital for people to shed their lax attitude. A second wave can emerge, especially in densely populated areas. A mass vaccination drive with the cooperation of the private sector is essential. Strict adherence to Covid protocols and safety measures should be made compulsory.

Chandan Kumar Nath,

Sorbhog

Corona and masks

It is a matter of concern that most people have stopped using masks. What is to be realized is that they are jeopardizing the lives of those around them. As a responsible citizen, we all need to be aware of the same.

All utility centres, shops, parlours, schools, colleges, banks etc should start keeping stocks of masks with them and should make it mandatory to wear them. Our government has laid down the rules and as responsible citizens, we ought to follow them which is for our own good.

During this resurgence of COVID, and before it starts to hound us with its ugly head, precautions like enforcing masks in our own small ways will perhaps lessen the menace to some extent.

Purabi P Barua,

Guwahati

Change names

given by British

The Madhya Pradesh government has changed the name of Hoshangabad city to Narmadapuram. Earlier, the Uttar Pradesh government also made some similar changes. But despite 74 years of the country getting independence, it is still dually named as Bharat in Hindu and India in English while all other countries in the region getting independence from British regime have abolished British-given names like in the case of Sri Lanka and Myanmar. Likewise our country should also be named simply as Bharat as per long-pending recommendation of Uttar Pradesh State Assembly. Likewise prominent roads of Delhi Sansad Marg should not be known as Parliament Street since popular nouns are never translated.

Distorted spellings of names of some cities like Jalandhar and Shimla were rightly changed as per actual pronunciation. But spellings of many more cities like Bareily and Meerut still remain to be changed. Even Delhi should be re-spelt as 'Dehli' which means entrance. The Tamil Nadu government in the year 2020 renamed and re-spelt distorted names or spellings of more than 1,000 cities, towns and villages to their original ones in one go. There are 32 Rampurs in India in different States causing big confusion to postal-department in case name of State is not mentioned. There should be only one Rampur, and names of rest other Rampurs should be appropriately changed. The Central government should change spellings of names of remaining cities simultaneously at one go taking State governments concerned in confidence.

Since western part of pre-independence undivided Bengal came to India, the State was named as West Bengal, and East Bengal turned into East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). The Central government should accept demand of West Bengal government for renaming the State as Bangla thus removing ever-confusing Prefix West. The proposed name will be one-worded and will not be able to be abbreviated like double-worded names UP, MP, HP, AP etc.

Subhash Chandra Agrawal,

Delhi

Bongaigaon College

Impingement upon my seniority by the Governing Body of Bongaigaon College and non-response from the Director of Higher Education's end towards my grievance stands as denial of justice to me. I am summarizing the entire episode of happenings with me which have simply de-motivated me in taking any responsibility in addition to my normal work.

The learned members of Governing Body (GB) of Bongaigaon College attempted to convict me on the basis of the show-cause notice regarding my Ph.D. from Magadh University awarded in the year 2005, not officially served to the college, neither any copy addressed to them. I happen to be one of those 136 faculty members who have been issued such show-cause notices on M.Phil/Ph.D issues by DHE office in June 2020 seeking satisfactory reply. I not only replied to the show-cause but also submitted the verification report issued by the university concerned regarding authenticity of my Ph.D degree. None of my counterparts have been deprived of their seniority benefit. Some of them have also been serving as heads of the institutions in their respective colleges. No GB of any college has taken up the issue without any official letter served to them from the Director of Higher Education's end, except Bongaigaon College.

Denial for the post of Vice Principal and subsequently for the post of Principal-in-charge to me is based on the office memorandum No. ABP.29/2006/38 dated 9th May 2006, which happens to be guidelines to be taken care of by the Departmental Promotion Committee while recommending for promotion to any staff to a higher post. The learned members of the GB consider such 'placement' to the post of Vice Principal or Principal i/c as cases of 'promotion' to a higher post. In fact, any such placements are made exclusively on seniority basis and are not the case of promotion to the best of my knowledge and belief. The subsequent endorsement of such misinterpretation from the end of the Director of Higher Education, Assam, by approving the GB's resolution simply negates justice desired under the provision of the constitution vide Article 311.

My above narrations are meant for clearing my stand over the entire issue. I have not been genuinely informed till date as to why my seniority is impinged upon with such misdeeds. I also draw the attention of the office-bearers of ACTA for intervention so that it may not become precedence for coming days in other colleges of Assam.

Tarun Kumar Bahadur,

Bongaigaon

Da, Dada and Didi

In the Bengali language, three words 'Da, Dada and Didi' are very common. In fact, West Bengal has been blessed with all the 'Da, Dada and Didi' – former President of India Bharat Ratna Late Pranab Mukherjee, a scholar and gentleman to the hilt, Saurav Ganguly, former skipper of Team India and currently serving as president of the BCCI and Miss Mamta Banerjee, CM of West Bengal. For the sake of political survival, Miss Mamata Banerjee is fighting desperately as the elections are approaching. Both Da (Pranab Mukherjee) and Dada (Saurav Ganguly) have made West Bengal proud, but what about Didi (Mamta Banerjee)? Only the time will say.

Lanu Dutta Chowdhury,

Guwahati.

Empowering consumers

The E-Daakhil portal for Consumer Grievance Redressal operating in 15 States is a welcome move. This digital platform for filing consumer complaints has many features like e-Notice, case document download link & Video Conferencing hearing link, filing written response by the opposite party, fling rejoinder by the complainant, and alerts via SMS/Email. The portal empowers the consumer and their advocates to file, the consumer complaints along with payment of requisite fees online from anywhere for the Redressal of their complaints. It also facilitates the consumer commissions to scrutinize the complaints online to accept, reject or forward the complaint to the commission concerned for further processing. The Common Service Centres have integrated to facilitate the rural consumers. Hope that this effort will prove worthwhile in redressing consumer complaints.

Amit Singh Kushwaha,

Satna (M.P.)