Performance indicators and pink slips are no longer the domain of grueling corporate jobs. Something fundamental is changing in public universities of India that have always provided their teachers job security and the comfort of fixed work hours. The government funded Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) plans to recruit faculty on their Hyderabad campus on a contractual basis. It is only after a regular annual assessment, which includes students' evaluation,...

Devas Multimedia has approached the International Court of Arbitration (ICA) seeking restoration of its contract with Indian Space Research Organisation's (ISRO) commercial arm Antrix which was terminated in February after allegations of wrongdoing emerged over the allocation of S-band spectrum. In February, the UPA government scrapped the controversial contract between Antrix Corporation and Bangalore-based Devas Multimedia for the lease of space segment in S-band. The government had said that it could...

The United Nations commemorates World Population Day next week against the backdrop of an upcoming landmark event: global population hitting the seven billion mark by late October this year. According to current projections, and with some of the world's poorest nations doubling their populations in the next decade, the second milestone will be in 2025: an eight billion population over the next 14 years. Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin, executive director of the U.N....

-The Hindu   Bill aims at making ethical committees looking into trials ‘robust' A legislation to monitor the entire Research on human bodies by a single authority is likely to be introduced in the winter session of Parliament, according to V.M. Katoch, Secretary, Department of Health Research. The Bill will seek to make the ethical committees, presently looking into clinical trials on human beings, ‘robust' by constituting a monitoring mechanism over them. It was felt...

The latest Supreme Court order appointing two former justices to superintend the special investigation team (SIT) on black money is a serious indictment of government. It reflects a widespread sentiment about the laws of government motion: government is a body that will not move unless compelled by an external force. A shameless government is provoking a thousand saviours to step in and save the country. The Supreme Court is, rightly,...