Usha Ramanathan works on the jurisprudence of law, poverty and rights. She writes and speaks on issues that include the nature of law, the Bhopal Gas Disaster, mass displacement, eminent domain, civil liberties including the death penalty, beggary, criminal law, custodial institutions, the environment, and the judicial process. She has been tracking and engaging with the UID project and has written and debated extensively on the subject. In July-September 2013, she wrote a 19-part series on the UID project that was published in The Statesman, a national daily.

Her work draws heavily upon non-governmental experience in its encounters with the state; a 6 year stint with a law journal (Supreme Court Cases) as reporter from the Supreme Court; and engagement with matters of law and public policy.

She was a member of: the Expert Group on Privacy set up by the Planning Commission of India which gave in its report in October 2012; a committee (2013-14) set up in the Department of Biotechnology to review the Draft Human DNA Profiling Bill 2012; and the Committee set up by the Prime Minister's Office (2013-14) to study the socio-economic status of tribal communities which gave its report to the government in 2014.

Tuesday, April 5, 2016

70 - Readers मजलिस: Reflections on Surveillance as Security & Crime and Punishment


Readers मजलिस: Reflections on Surveillance as Security & Crime and Punishment


We at Paradigm Shift in collaboration with People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) are hosting Readers मजलिस on 24th September, at 18:30. The topic of conversation is Surveillance as Security & Crime and Punishment. Dr. Usha Ramanathan,internationally recognized expert on law and poverty, will be sharing her reflections and facilitating the conversation on the same.

The outline of the conversation is given below and certain answers for pertinent questions will be evolved during the session. 

Surveillance as security: UID, Natgrid, NPR, Netra, CCTVs, CCTNS, these are some acronyms. Databasing, convergence, tagging, tracking, profiling are emerging phenomena. Corruption, terrorism, brutal rape, inefficiency are offered to explain the normalising of surveillance. ID numbers in repositories, biometrics, DNA in databases, camera capture of faces and persons. Fear, alarm, threat, risk. The Transparent Individual, turning the RTI on its head. 

Does surveillance really make the citizen/resident secure? 

Crime and Punishment: It is axiomatic that the state makes the law and so decides what is a crime, what should be punished, how, and how much. 

What is it about the death penalty and the state? Why is the court so uncomfortable with it while the executive state embraces it with an ardour unbecoming of one that is meant to protect life? Why is protest a matter of `law and order' and not of politics? Why is beggary a crime, punishable with indefinite incarceration? What has `docket explosion' to do with crime and punishment? What has the breakdown of the criminal justice system to do with scapegoating, the diluting of fair trial standards, and the death of innocence? 

About Dr. Usha Ramanathan: 

Dr. Ramanathan is a research fellow at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, teaches environmental law, labour law and consumer law at the Indian Law Institute and is a regular guest professor many universities around the world. 

Dr Ramanathan is also the South Asia Editor of the Law, Environment and Development Journal (LEAD Journal), a peer-reviewed academic journal jointly published by IELRC and SOAS. 

Her research interests include human rights, displacement, torts and environment. She has published extensively in India and abroad. In particular, she has devoted her attention to a number of specific issues such as the Bhopal gas disaster, the Narmada valley dams or slum eviction in Delhi.


For more details you can write to paradigmshiftbangalore@gmail.com or call @+919663427315
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