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Narmada Bachao Andolan
A court here on Monday suspended the sentence of five months' simple imprisonment awarded to Narmada Bachao Andolan leader Medha Patkar in a defamation case filed against her by Delhi Lieutenant Governor V K Saxena 23 years ago, when he headed an NGO in Gujarat. On an appeal filed by Patkar, Metropolitan Magistrate Raghav Sharma suspended the sentence and also issued a notice to the opposite party (LG), Saxena's counsel Gajinder Kumar said. The court also granted bail to Patkar on a bail bond and surety bond of Rs 25,000, he said. Kumar, who received the notice, said a reply has to be filed before the next date of hearing in the matter on September 4. The court had sentenced Patkar to jail on July 1. The court had convicted Patkar on May 24, observing that her statements calling Saxena a "coward" and alleging his involvement in "hawala" transactions were not only defamatory per se, but also crafted to incite negative perceptions about him. Also, the accusation that the complainan
Narmada Bachao Andolan leader Medha Patkar on Monday said infrastructure projects should not be launched without properly assessing their ecological impact as she extended support to the Joshimath Bachao Sangharsh Samiti. Arriving in the subsidence-hit Uttarakhand town on Monday, Patkar apologised for visiting late. "The Joshimath crisis is a warning bell. The authorities must wake up to the damage caused by mega development projects to the fragile Himalayan ecology," she said. Infrastructure projects should not be launched without properly assessing their impact on the ecology, Patkar added. She also addressed a meeting organised by the Joshimath Bachao Sangharsh Samiti on the tehsil premises and said she stood with the affected people. The Samiti's 11-point list of demands includes the permanent scrapping of the NTPC's Tapovan-Vishnugad hydel power and the Helang-Marwadi bypass road projects that, it feels, are responsible for the subsidence crisis in Joshimath. It has also dema