-The Indian Express To fulfil the constitutional requirement, reservation must be based on a rigorous identification of economic backwardness. The introduction of the 124th constitutional amendment that provides the possibility of quotas for the “economically weaker sections” (EWS) has rekindled the debate on reservations. These quotas diverge from reservation policies for the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and other socially and educationally backward classes, by jettisoning caste or community identity as the...

-CaravanMagazine.in India is often hailed for its democracy, for empowering its poor and ordinary citizens to participate in the electoral process and play a role in shaping the country. This narrative has increasingly come under strain since the Supreme Court, through its March 2003 judgment in Union of India vs Association for Democratic Reforms, made it mandatory for candidates contesting elections to disclose their wealth, educational qualification, and criminal cases pending...

-The Indian Express For all their talk on farm distress, on agriculture, BJP, Congress show they have not learnt from past failures. We often feel proud of our democratic system. But it also has a shortcoming, which has been magnified in the current election season. The conversation today is not about what the BJP/NDA promised in its manifesto of 2014, and how far they have been able to deliver on their...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Delhi government's decision to install CCTV cameras in classrooms of state-run schools and provide a live feed to parents has been challenged by a law student on the grounds that this violates the right to privacy of adolescent girls and female teachers. The Supreme Court on Friday sought the AAP government's response to the PIL that seeks scrapping of the decision. The Delhi government had...

-PTI NEW DELHI: The State Bank of India has sold electoral bonds worth over Rs 3,622 crore in March and April this year, an RTI response has said. In a response provided to Pune-based Vihar Durve, the SBI said electoral bonds of Rs 1,365.69 crore were sold in March, which shot up by 65.21 per cent in April to Rs 2,256.37 crore. In April, most electoral bonds were sold in Mumbai at Rs...