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The Acquittal in Mumbai of Paedophilia Case Raises a Number of Questions.
The Freddy Peats case in Goa in 1991 first brought the term "paedophilia" into public discourse in this country. Since then, there has been acknowledgement, reluctantly though, that child sexual abuse (CSA) exists in our society whether within or outside the confines of the family, and steps have been taken to punish the offenders.
But now the Mumbai High Court has acquitted two Englishmen accused of sexually abusing boys in the shelter that they ran in the city. Their acquittal raises a number of questions about the legal and social complexities involved in dealing with child sexual abuse in general and paedophilia cases involving foreigners, in particular.
In 2006 the two men (Duncan Grant set up the shelter, Anchorage, in 1995 and Alan Waters was a frequent visitor) were sentenced to six years rigorous imprisonment by an additional sessions judge on charges of sexual abuse based on the evidence of five boys.
The high court while acquitting them noted that there were discrepancies between the statements made by two complainants before the police and in the court, that it was "unnatural" that the victims did not complain for several years, that the investigation had been done by the amicus curiae rather than by the police and that the prosecution had not been able to prove the guilt of the accused beyond a shadow of doubt.
Economic & Political Weekly (EPW) -
A first: Kerala reserves post for HIV positive
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: This is a quota that is unlikely to be embroiled in a debate about merit dilution and fairness. Kerala became the first Indian state on Tuesday to reserve a government job for HIV positive candidates, marking a new sensitivity for those afflicted with the killer virus.
The Kerala State Aids Control Society (KSACS) announced that it had reserved a vacancy in its office for HIV positive candidates with the hope that the presence of such a person will improve coordination and communication with groups at risk and ensure effective prevention.
"We have issued advertisements inviting applications to the post of coordinator, People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLHA), only from candidates who are HIV positive. Earlier, we had set this as a desirable factor, but then we decided to make it an essential one," KSACS project director and special secretary, health, Usha Titus told TOI.
"Right now in Kerala, we have what is called 'drop-in centres'. They work to facilitate grouping or association of people with HIV/AIDS. The belief is that when they come together, they would get to share their problems and it would be a great relaxing factor," Titus said.
Times of India -
3 pharma cos to make AIDS drugs affordable
MUMBAI: Under sustained pressure from AIDS activists, three multinational pharma companies have frozen price of certain AIDS drugs.
Cipla, which has played a singular role in setting the global benchmark for cheaper AIDS drugs and has forced MNCs to revise prices, is all set to lower the prices of its AIDS drugs for the domestic market. Late last week, Merck garnered some goodwill in the AIDS community with price-freezes and discounts on its HIV drugs.
Merck agreed to freeze till 2010, the price of its novel HIV drug at $9,900 a year, its launch price. Separately, Merck also agreed to offer discounts of up to 40% on other AIDS drugs in Mexico. This decrease comes in the wake of price reductions by Gilead Sciences and Boehringer-Ingelheim.
Amrita Nair-Ghaswalla, for TNN -
India’s writers tell Aids stories
Some of India's best-known writers have come together in a unique anthology of writing which tells the human stories behind HIV/Aids in the country.
India has one of the largest numbers of HIV-positive people in the world and they suffer serious social stigma.
Aids Sutra: Untold Stories from India has been published in collaboration with Avahan, the India Aids initiative of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, a leading HIV prevention project.
Roughly $2 from the proceeds of each book sold will go to support children affected by HIV/Aids in cities which have a high prevalence of the disease.
For the project, 16 writers travelled across the country to talk to housewives, vigilantes, homosexuals, drug addicts, policemen and sex workers - and served up engaging essays on the disease and its fallout in India.
BBC News -
An HIV-Positive person cannot be denied employment in Police Department solely on the ground of HIV
The Chairman, State Level Police Recruitment Board v. X, Indian Inhabitant
Mr. X, a Reserve Police Constable, had applied for the post of Sub-Inspector of Police (Civil). He qualified both the physical and written tests and was provisionally selected as Sub-Inspector. But he was denied employment when he tested HIV-positive. The Police Department relied on Order 70 (3) of the A.P. Revised Police Manual which prohibited the appointment of, otherwise eligible HIV-Positive candidates as Sub-Inspector of Police.
Mr. X first approached the A.P. Administrative Tribunal, which held that he was not entitled to any relief as the Order 70(3) of the A.P. Police manual permitted the State to deny employment to HIV-positive candidates.
Aggrieved by the judgement of the Tribunal, Mr. X filed a Writ Petition in the A.P. High Court challenging the constitutionality of the Order 70(3) for its blanket ban on employing HIV-Positive candidates. Mr. X adduced cogent evidence that an HIV-Positive person is healthy, functionally fit and productive during the asymptomatic period, which can range from 3 to 18 years till the onset of AIDS. Hence denial of employment Mr. X only on the ground of HIV infringes his right to life and livelihood. The High Court, relying on MX v. ZY AIR 1997 Bom 406 held:
Lawyers Collective HIV/AIDS Unit -
Research On ‘Elite Controllers’ To Improve AIDS Vaccine Design
Mexico City: A tiny group of people, also found in India, with a rare gift - they are infected with HIV but manage to stay healthy - may soon become the centre of attraction for the world's top AIDS scientists, looking to find a vaccine against the deadly HIV virus.
A new roadmap announced by the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative at the International AIDS conference here has asked scientists to solve the Cell Mediated Immunity (CMI) problem while developing a candidate vaccine. The recommendation says, "We know that there are rare individuals, known as elite controllers, who are infected with HIV, but are able to keep the virus in check for decades without any sign of disease. More resources should be devoted to studying the mechanisms behind this phenomena which could provide vital clues for improved vaccine design."
It adds, "What's more, nonhuman primates vaccinated with a live, but weakened form of the simian equivalent of HIV (known as SIV) mount an immune response that protects them from SIV disease. More attention should be paid to study this mechanism too. Canadian and American scientists have been working on finding what makes these elite controllers special and genetically what makes them so strong against HIV.
Experts say these controllers account for about 1 out of 300 people infected with HIV but have been largely invisible to AIDS researchers because they do not get sick and therefore do not qualify for clinical studies.
Koutenya Sinha, for The Times of India -
HIV positive men can now father children
It was the prick of a needle that changed life irrevocably for Chandigarh-based medical practitioner Amogh Singh (name changed on request). The needle passed on the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (or HIV) to the 32-year-old doctor. Among his many concerns was his despair at believing he would never be able to have a child.
But that changed a few months ago. Singh can now father a child because of a unique in-vitro fertilisation process that was developed in the west and has now become available in India. He and his wife have begun packing their bags and will soon arrive in Mumbai to try out the new procedure. The treatment will help the couple have a child without passing on the infection either to the mother or the newborn, by separating uninfected sperm cells in Singhs sperm sample.
"The procedure, called the Density Gradient Centrifugation, separates the sperm cell and eliminates the virus effectively from the seminal fluid where the virus is generally found," says Anirudh Malpani, a Mumbai-based IVF practitioner. The process involves high-speed rotation of the patients sperm sample in a test tube. This causes the uninfected cells to rise to the top of the tube, while the infected cells settle at the bottom.
Recent research shows encouraging results in the separation of infected sperms from non-infected ones for IVF. "We have established a very simple and effective method to isolate sperm cells from even poor quality infected semen. Its called tilted-tube rotation method and with it, we have been successful in recovering motile sperm from positive males with heavy viral loads," says Naoaki Kuji of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Keio University School of Medicine. Kuji has developed the Density Gradient Centrifugation process.
Aditya Ghosh, for The Hindustan Times -
False Hopes Leave +ve Persons In Trauma
Dimapur | August 10 : After their slow painful struggle to come to terms with their condition, a group of HIV positive people in Nagaland recently had all their hopes, faith and trust dashed to the ground with the false assurance of having been cured. An enthusiastic preacher from Mizoram - who was in the state capital for a healing crusade - decided to take his gift of healing to the HIV positive patients, and rounded up several of the lot at NMAs Hospice in Kohima, where he preached, prayed and declared them "cured".
The preacher was accompanied by a top bureaucrat of the state, senior officials of the Medical department and the Nagaland State Aids Control Society (NSACS) as well as members of the Naga Mothers Association (NMA).
It was disclosed that on August 2, Saturday, the said preacher along with the bureaucrats, visited Cradle Ridge, an NSACS-funded and NMA-run HIV/AIDS hospice in Kohima. After having prayed over them, the preacher declared that all the positive persons gathered there have been cured except one person who was repeatedly prayed over until he was declared cured after the third prayer.
After the "curing", the preacher challenged the positive people to get retested for HIV/AIDS when the hospital reopened on Monday. But the euphoria for the positive patients lasted only till 12 oclock, Monday (having waited eagerly for the result of their retest), when they were found still HIV positive.
Bonnie Konyak, for The Morung Express
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Don’t repeal Section 377: Homosexuals
MUMBAI: While the homosexuals in India have welcomed Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss' statement seeking the removal of provisions in Section 377of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) that classifies sex between two men as a criminal offence, they do not want the repeal of the section to protect the boy child from abuse.
Delhi based NGO Naz Foundation challenged arrests made under Section 377 and the Delhi High Court is hearing a petition by the Foundation.
Says, Nitin Karani, Board of Trustee of Mumbai based Humsafar Trust "Section 377 is applicable even to the heterosexuals, as it prohibits anal sex (even) between husband and wife. We are demanding that consensual sex in private between individuals not be considered illegal. But Section 377 is needed so that children are not abused. Hence, it should be read down but not abolished."
Vasundhara Sanger, for Times of India
© 2008 Wake Up Pune.
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