-Newsclick.in With sixty percent children malnourished in the state, the implementation of the Integrated Child Development Services, the largest scheme to provide nutrition to children in the country, is nothing but a sham. Sitting outside her semi-pucca house in Bilgram block, Kasturi says, "My children get five fistful of panjiri once a month from the Aanganwadi Centre." Thirty-three year-old Kasturi has never, in her parents' village or her in-law's village seen an...

-NDTV A Parliamentary standing committee has agreed with the government that political parties do not come under the Right to Information or RTI Act. The landmark transparency law, passed by the UPA I government in 2005, is often flaunted by Congress Number 2 Rahul Gandhi as a precursor to the anti-corruption Lokpal Bill, currently being pushed by the government in Parliament. All political parties barring Odisha-based Biju Janata Dal and the Communist Party...

-The Business Standard Nearly half the 3,337 politicians contesting elections in 5 states have not provided details of their I-T returns With total assets of around Rs 56 crore, Dhanvantri Chandela, fielded by the Congress from the Rajouri Garden constituency, is easily one of the richest among candidates for the Delhi Assembly election. But she neither has a permanent account number (PAN) nor has she reported details of her income-tax returns to...

-The Hindustan Times New Delhi: In the run-up to the 2014 general elections, it's party time in India. No fewer than 142 political parties have been registered with the Election Commission in the past two months. From 1,392 parties in August-September, the number swelled to 1,534 by mid-November. Godmen, builders, property dealers and retired bureaucrats are among those who have floated the parties, ostensibly to have a say in the world's largest democracy. Election...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: Some 55,000 women and girls trafficked from Bengal are working as maids in Delhi, many of them "sold as bonded labourers" to wealthy households where they slog for ungodly hours without pay and are often tortured or sexually abused. More than half these women are minors - many as young as 10 - who are duped with promises of a better life and brought to the capital by...