eBook & eJournal | Reports and resources on human rights, rights of indigenous people & forest rights

India’s representative at the 2007 United Nations General Assembly affirmed his government’s commitment promotion and protection of indigenous peoples’ rights | Learn more >>

Find up-to-date information provided by, for and about Indian authors, researchers, officials, and educators

List of sites covered by this Google SafeSearch engine

Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE) – www.atree.org

Freedom United – www.freedomunited.org

Government of India (all websites ending on “.gov.in”)

Kalpavriksh Environmental Action Group – https://kalpavriksh.org

Shodhganga (a reservoir of Indian theses) – https://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in

Survival International – www.survivalinternational.org

UCLA Digital Library – https://digital.library.ucla.edu

Unesco – https://en.unesco.org

Unesco digital library – https://unesdoc.unesco.org

Unicef – www.unicef.org

United Nations – www.un.org/en

Video Volunteers – www.videovolunteers.org

WorldCat (“the world’s largest library catalog, helping you find library materials online”) – https://worldcat.org

Search tips

Combine the name of any particular state, language or region with that of any tribal (Adivasi) community.

Add keywords of special interest (music, poetry, dance just as health, sacred grove and biodiversity); learn about the rights of Scheduled Tribes such as the “Forest Rights Act” (FRA); and the United Nations “Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples”, “Universal Declaration of Human Rights”, “women’s rights”, or “children’s right to education”.

Ask a question that includes “tribal” or “Adivasi”, for instance: “Adivasi way of life better?” (or “tribal way of life worse?”)

Specify any particular issue or news item (biodiversity, bonded labour and human trafficking, climate change, ecology, economic development, ethnobotany, ethnomedicine, global warming, hunter-gatherers in a particular region or state, prevention of rural poverty, water access).

For official figures include “scheduled tribe ST” along with a union state or region: e.g. “Chhattisgarh ST community”, “Himalayan tribe”, “Scheduled tribe Tamil Nadu census”, “ST Kerala census”, “Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group Jharkhand”, “PVTG Rajasthan”, “Adivasi ST Kerala”, “Adibasi ST West Bengal” etc.

SafeSearch browser tips

If your (mobile) browser fails to display “embedded” media contents, Google maps and SafeSearch windows

Try another browser like Firefox, Chrome or Safari available on your device

Ensure your favourite browser is up to date

Close your present browser

Check your browser and mobile (gsm) settings:
e.g. permission for video or JavaScript
(seen under Preferences >Security >Enable JavaSript)

Restart your computer (smartphone, tablet)

Reconnect to your wifi network or connect to a different one

On some iPhone models the following helps:

>Settings >Safari >scroll down to:
SETTING FOR WEBSITES

Enable “Request Desktop Website” (All Websites) temporarily

Return to the map-post in Safari and “Reload”

Return to >Settings and disable “Request Desktop Website” again

Return to the post in Safari and “Reload”which should now display “embedded” contents as intended (with the convenience of browsing the mobile version on a small screen)

Note: similar solutions may also work with other mobile operating systems.

Tip: research this topic with the help of Shodhganga: a reservoir of Indian theses >>

The National Human Right Commission (NHRC) describes “crimes like rape, molestation, torture, fake encounter in police custody as manifestations of a systemic failure to protect human rights”;

It reports that “rights of the people were violated or negligence was shown by a public servant in the prevention of such violations”; NHRC concludes:

“Atrocities against vulnerable sections of society – women, children, disabled and the elderly – are often compounded when they belong to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes”; and therefore demands:

India must ratify the International Convention against Torture.

The Anti-Autocracy Handbook – A Scholars’ Guide to Navigating Democratic Backsliding
Download | Backup (PDF, 500 KB) >>

“A call to action, resilience, and collective defence of democracy, truth, and academic freedom”

The Anti-Autocracy Handbook is a call to action, resilience, and collective defence of democracy, truth, and academic freedom in the face of mounting authoritarianism. […]

Because open inquiry and dissent are central to science and academia—qualities antithetical to authoritarian control—academia is often among the first targets of autocrats. To help scholars resist authoritarian developments, the handbook highlights both historic and contemporary measures aimed at attacking scholars, their institutional environments, and their scholarship.

The handbook also sets out a framework for action based on personal risk level—low, medium, high, or extreme. This is designed to help scholars think about their own risk and purposefully choose actions in line with it. The handbook considers tools for enhancing digital safety and highlights the importance of ongoing documentation, preserving imperilled data, and creating distributed archives as a defence against erasure. It also calls on scholars to tell their stories—publicly or anonymously—to inspire others, maintain accountability and preserve a historical record.

Accompanying the handbook is a living wiki that will continue to incorporate new developments and provide updates on global efforts by scholars to push back against authoritarianism and safeguard the democratic foundations that enable free inquiry.

Source: “The Anti-Autocracy Handbook: A Scholars’ Guide to Navigating Democratic Backsliding” by
URL: https://zenodo.org/records/15696097
Date Visited: 20 April 2026

Albert Camus on service of truth and the service of liberty – Nobelprize.org

Excerpt from Albert Camus’ speech at the Nobel Banquet at the City Hall in Stockholm, December 10, 1957 | Read the full speech: https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1957/camus/speech/ >>

By the same token, the writer’s role is not free from difficult duties. By definition he cannot put himself today in the service of those who make history; he is at the service of those who suffer it. Otherwise, he will be alone and deprived of his art. Not all the armies of tyranny with their millions of men will free him from his isolation, even and particularly if he falls into step with them. But the silence of an unknown prisoner, abandoned to humiliations at the other end of the world, is enough to draw the writer out of his exile, at least whenever, in the midst of the privileges of freedom, he manages not to forget that silence, and to transmit it in order to make it resound by means of his art.

None of us is great enough for such a task. But in all circumstances of life, in obscurity or temporary fame, cast in the irons of tyranny or for a time free to express himself, the writer can win the heart of a living community that will justify him, on the one condition that he will accept to the limit of his abilities the two tasks that constitute the greatness of his craft: the service of truth and the service of liberty. Because his task is to unite the greatest possible number of people, his art must not compromise with lies and servitude which, wherever they rule, breed solitude. Whatever our personal weaknesses may be, the nobility of our craft will always be rooted in two commitments, difficult to maintain: the refusal to lie about what one knows and the resistance to oppression.

India’s human rights commission has stepped in after the plight of a jailed 80-year-old poet who contracted Covid-19 in prison prompted outrage. […]
The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) order, which follows outrage both at home and globally, also said expenses relating to Mr Rao’s treatment would be borne by the state as he was an under trial prisoner and therefore its responsibility. […]
Despite several attempts by his lawyers, he has been consistently denied bail. And though he’s been in jail for two years, the case he is charged in has not been brought to the courts. […]
Earlier, a consortium of more than 100 global intellectuals, including Noam Chomsky and Homi K Bhabha, had called for his release. Several international organisations have also expressed concern at his plight. […]
In May [2020], the European Parliament Subcommittee on Human Rights wrote to Home Minister Amit Shah saying it was alarmed by the ‘intimidation and harassment of human rights defenders’ by the authorities.

Source: “Outrage as jailed Indian poet contracts Covid” by Analysis by Soutik Biswas (BBC News, 17 July 2020)
URL: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-53441846
Date visited: 7 May 2021

[Bold typeface added above for emphasis]

Reports and resources for education and research purposes

Related