Study of fatal burns cases in Kanpur (India)

Epidemiological and medicolegal, including forensic pathological, aspects of 180 cases of fatal burns were studied in Kanpur (India) during the period of one year (October 1985 to September 1986). These constituted 10.79% of the total medicolegal deaths autopsied. Majority of the victims were young Hindu housewives burnt within 5 years of their marriage. The most common source of fire was cooking apparatus like chulha, coalfire, stove or cooking gas. In a substantial number of cases, kerosene oil was poured over the victims and fired with a match stick. About half of the burn cases were accidental, in which cooking on open unguarded flames and loose highly inflammable synthetic sarees of the victims can be blamed. Among the others who died in suspicious circumstances, i.e., burnt alive or forced to commit suicide by fire, dowry and family quarrels and marital disharmony were the two important predisposing factors. Illiteracy, arranged and child marriages, joint family structure, oedipal dominance of mother-in-laws, unemployment and economic dependence of the husband on the parents, near complete dependence of women on their husbands and inlaws, and lack of social security amongst Hindu females were other contributory factors affecting the incidence in some way. Male burn deaths were few and usually accidental.     

A study of fatal strangulation cases in Varanasi (India)

Strangulation is one of the oldest and widely used methods of committing murder in the Indian subcontinent. It is usually carried out by constricting the neck either with the hands, elbow, or other parts of body or by ligature, stick, and the like. In this paper we report a study of 26 cases of fatal strangulation occurring in the district of Varanasi (India) during 1982-1983 and analyze their epidemiological, medicolegal, and forensic pathological aspects. The paper also projects the mentality of perpetrators who, after strangling their victims, tried to hide the crime by disposing of the dead bodies by burning, burying, hanging, throwing them into water, or concealing them in distant places in most of the cases.     

THE OPERATIONAL DIMENSIONS OF RESULTS‐BASED FINANCING

As part of a growing focus on the effectiveness of development assistance from the World Bank and other agencies, new efforts are being made to relate development finance more closely to outcomes achieved rather than to inputs used, through the results‐based financing approach. We provide a framework for analyzing the operational dimensions of results‐based financing, including the conditions that suit this approach, and how best to define, measure, and report results. We review some of the early World Bank experience with this approach. Noting that this approach is as yet not fully tested, we suggest evaluative issues for future research while highlighting strengths and challenges in the range of techniques adopted so far. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Down and Out: Laboring under Global Capitalism

The text and photographs in this photo essay are excerpted with permission from Down and Out: Labouring under Global Capitalism (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), by Jan Breman and Arvind N. Das (text) and Ravi Agarwal (photographs).     

Sexual Dimorphism in Ulna: An Osteometric Study from India

Determination of sex constitutes the most important element during the identification process of human skeletal remains. Several sex‐specific features of human skeleton have been exploited for sex determination with varying reliability. This study aims to obtain sexual dimorphic standards for ulnae of the north Indian population. Eight measurements were obtained on a sample of 106 ulnae (males‐80, females‐26) in the age range of 25–65 years. The sexual dimorphism index and demarking points were calculated for all the variables. The data were then subjected to stepwise and direct discriminant function analysis. The best discriminator of sex was the maximum length (84.9%) followed by radial notch width (84%). In stepwise analysis, these two variables were selected and provided an accuracy of 88.7% (M‐87.5%, F‐92.3%). The proximal end provided a classification rate of 81.1% (M‐80%, F‐84.6%) with selection of the notch length and olecranon width.