The Centre for Development and Human Rights (CDHR), New Delhi, has been publishing a quarterly ‘bulletin’ on rights and development since 2007. Our bulletin is addressed to human rights activists, academics, public servants, the NGO community and the interested public. Its purpose is to promote awareness of current developments in the area of human rights and development, with a focus on rights-based approaches to development and the Right to Development (RTD). Our bulletin’s scope is broader than that of other rights-focused publications, in that we focus not only on concerns relating to civil and political rights, but also to economic, social and cultural rights, and group and collective rights (in other words, second and third generation rights). Our primary focus is on India, though from time to time, we carry materials with a more regional or global focus.
Our bulletin is prepared primarily by CDHR’s staff researchers and interns, though guest contributions are always welcome (the bios of our staff researchers and interns are provided on the CDHR website: www.cdhr.org.in). To enquire about guest contributions and internships, please write to cdhrjournal@gmail.com. We recognize the importance of young people in the development and dissemination of the rights discourse, and are thus particularly interested in involving college and university in the writing and production of the Bulletin, as well as in other aspects of the organization. Most of our staff researchers and interns are university students, and while we employ a copy editor in the preparation of the Bulletin, we try to preserve the voice of our writers as much as possible. We believe that writing for the Bulletin is as much a part of human rights education as the final product is a tool in its furtherance.
I am pleased to bring you the fourth and final issue of the Rights & Development Bulletin for 2011. This issue carries articles on a wide range of topics relevant to development, human rights and social justice, including the status of educational rights and disability rights in India, the significance of the Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights’ (OHCHR) Universal Periodic Review (UPR) for India, and the debate on the abolition of the death penalty. Many of these articles were inspired by workshops and events in which CDHR participated over the last three months, including a conference on the abolition of the death penalty in India (co-organized with Jindal Global University), consultations for the UPR held by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), and a workshop held by Jawaharlal Nehru University’s Equal Opportunity Office and HURITER (Centre for Promotion of Human Rights Teaching and Research) to celebrate human rights day (10th December).
Since 2011 marked the 25th anniversary of the UN Declaration on the Right to Development, we open and close the issue with commemorative statements by the UN General Secretary and High Commissioner for Human Rights. Regular readers of the Bulletin will know that my father and the founding Chairman of CDHR, the late Dr. Arjun K. Sengupta, was a leading authority on the Right to Development (he was the UN’s Independent Expert on the Right to Development and the Chair of the OHCHR’s Intergovernmental Working Group on the Right to Development). Our final issue of this very special year is thus dedicated to his memory.
The CDHR team hopes that you enjoy the issue, and that you return to us with comments and suggestions for improvement. |
