Home push for assault victims

Mumbai (PTI): In cases of domestic violence, the victim should be first given the right to possession of the house of her spouse to ensure her protection, family court judge Roshan Dalvi has said.

?It will solve most of the cases,? she said at a meet on proposed laws on domestic violence here on Saturday.

The judge said in most cases of domestic violence, the victims are thrown out of their homes. She cited instances of the UK and Canada where victims get special suites in such cases. ?We don?t have such infrastructure but we can at least help them have a place to live,? Dalvi said.

Advocate and human rights activist Indira Jaising said judges in family courts should be sensitised towards cases of domestic violence. Addressing the inaugural session, she said judges should treat matters of domestic violence as an emergency. ?It (domestic violence) is an indication of emergency and is not a litigation that can wait. It means that an action is awaited,? she said, adding that delay may lead to loss of life of the victims.

Ammu Abraham from Women?s Centre said in many cases the parents of the girl are also responsible for her suffering. ?They (family members) force them to go back to the houses of their husbands and ask them to adjust there,? she said.

Man uses e-mail for talaq

Lucknow (PTI): A man has reportedly divorced his wife through e-mail in Bareilly district of Uttar Pradesh. Rahat Iqbal, living in the US, is reported to have recently given triple talaq to his wife Rubab Anwar through e-mail.

Rubab was married to Iqbal in 1998, but barely after a month or so her husband left for the US promising to send her a visa within 20 days.

She received a triple talaq message from Iqbal in her e-mail last week. Though she immediately challenged the talaq in a court, the issue has posed the question before Muslim scholars whether talaq through e-mails and SMS was justified in the eyes of Islam.

?Triple talaq is very much effective in Islam but the authenticity of the communication must be established as anyone can misuse the method,? said Darul-ul-ifta Firangi Mahal secretary and All India Muslim Personal Law Board member Khalid Rashid. The Muslim personal law board spokesman, Mohammad Hashim Qureshi, however, chose to remain non-committal on the matter.

1 killed in Ranbaxy fire

Mohali: A fire broke out in the pharmaceutical plant of Ranbaxy Laboratories Limited here on Saturday, killing one person and injuring two, reports our correspondent.

The two injured are being treated for burns and said to be out of danger. The incident occurred in the dryer unit of the solvent mixing plant. The police have registered a criminal case against Ranbaxy?s management.

Munitions find

Ahmedabad (PTI): Police have recovered 125 cartridges from a consignment of scrap at Kandla port in Kutch district. ?The cartridges, recovered yesterday (Saturday), were small in size and several contained powder, while some were empty. They were found in a scrap consignment and customs officials are looking into the matter,? Kandla police said.

Uplinking norms

New Delhi (PTI): The government has extended the uplinking arrangement of news and current affairs TV channels till December 31 to examine various issues related to revising the guidelines. The deadline for the existing norms, which had been extended earlier, was Sunday. The government is in the process of revising the guidelines related to the eligibility criteria for uplinking of news and current affairs channels from India.

Teacher shot

Moga (PTI): Unidentified people shot dead a schoolteacher in Jogewala village near here. Surjit Singh, a science teacher at the government senior secondary school in Kahansinghwala village was shot when he was going to school on Saturday.

Panchayat polls

Srinagar (PTI): The Jammu and Kashmir government has decided to dissolve the existing panchayats and hold fresh elections to these institutions between January 15 and February 15 next year, rural development and panchayati raj minister Peerzada said on Sunday.

The Jammu and Kashmir government is planning a Rs 200-crore modernisation project for Srinagar. Beautification projects are also being planned for shrines including Khanqah-i-Moalla and Dastigeer Sahib.