The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) is another tool to deprive a large population from voting rights. SIR is not a revision of the electoral roll but De-novo-isation of the electoral roll. The revision term is misleading. In the past too, revision of the electoral roll was carried out, but no documents were asked from the existing voters.
Secondly, earlier, the facilitation of voter ID was the duty of the ECI. Now it’s transferred to the citizens to obtain voter ID. In this way the citizens from the lower strata of the society, mostly backwards, Schedule Castes, Schedule Tribes, migrant workers, landless people, nomads, etc. will remain outside the electoral system. This exercise is dangerous for a country like India where discrimination and deprivation is rampant.
- Naushad Ansari
Anisabad, Patna
Banning of Books in J&K
According to media reports, the Jammu & Kashmir government has banned as many as 25 books on Kashmir. It is quite possible that a ban on more books may be in the pipeline. The notification says that 25 books banned are “found to excite secessionism and endangering sovereignty & integrity of India, thereby attracting the provisions of Sections 152, 196, 197 of BNS, 2023.”
A cursory look at the list of books shows that there is nothing in the books which radicalises youths or jeopardises national integration. All these books are of academic nature and give historical facts which are suppressed by vested interests.
The authors of these books are internationally renowned for their scholarship and original work, to name a few: Mr. A.G. Noorani (a constitutionalist), Victoria Schofield (a British author and historian) AnnuradhaBhasin (an eminent journalist)
The present dispensation feels that if the books are not banned, their regime will be endangered or jeopardised and not the national integration. This shows insecurity in the minds of rulers. Actions of the government are to choke the democratic voices and promote fascism.
Let all the democratic, secular and human rights organisations strengthen the hands of dissenting voices, support the authors whose books are banned and pressurise the regime to withdraw its notification with immediate effect.
Let me quote a judgement by Chief Justice of the Madras High Court, Justice S.K. Kaul, while quashing the criminal case against Perumal Murugan: “There is no compulsion to read a book. Literary tests may vary, what is right and acceptable to one may not be so to others. Yet, the right to write is unhindered.”
Thus, the state cannot compel the public what to read, what to wear, what to eat and vice versa.
Farooq AbdulgafarBawani
Rajkot, Gujarat, India
Targeting Journalists
The gruesome killing of Al Jazeera correspondent Anas al- Sharif and four other reporters by Israel has happened soon after Benjamin Netanyahu announced his plan to occupy the whole of Gaza. It portends his nefarious intent to decimate the media apparatus in Gaza, before he allows the IDF to commit massacre of the Palestinians.
And it also flies in the face of his recent announcement that he wants to allow foreign journalists into the Gaza Strip. It is high time the journalists across the world stood in unison to condemn Israel vociferously.
Syed Sultan Mohiddin
Kadapa, A.P.
‘Wrong Traditions in the month of Muharram’
I refer to Nazir Ahmad Kazi’s article “Wrong Traditions in the month of Muharram” (Radiance, 12 July 2025). He himself contradicted the subject by mentioning the importance of the month of Muharram with shahadat of Hazrat Hussain, the grandson of Prophet Muhammad ﷺ. The Shahadat of Hazrat Hussain has no link to the true Islamic tradition of the importance of the month of Muharram. This month repeatedly came during the life of Sahabas even before the tragic and unfortunate event of Karbala and the Sahabas quite sincerely followed Prophet Muhammad ﷺ by fasting on 9th and 10th or 10th and 11th of Muharram to mark the importance of this month.
To be very honest, no ritual can be part of Islam which has come into practice after the Departure of Prophet Muhammad ﷺ.
The shirk and bida’ah in this month will continue unless we delink the importance of this month from the shahadat of Hazrat Hussain.
Mohammad Osama Rawat
Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh