-The Indian Express  Buckling under pressure from political parties, the government Monday agreed to retain 18 years as the age for consensual sex. It also decided to dilute the provisions on stalking and voyeurism in the proposed Criminal law (Amendment) Bill, 2013, which seeks to strengthen laws to deal with sexual crimes against women. The changes were cleared at a Cabinet meeting and the Bill will be introduced in Parliament Tuesday. The decision...

-The Times of India Faced with all-around political opposition, the cabinet on Monday retained 18 as age of consent for consensual sex, graded punishment for stalking and voyeurism and deleted "persistent watching" as an offence while clearing a new law to protect women. The changes were agreed to after a meeting on Monday where political leaders raised concerns ranging from genuine apprehensions to frivolous over the possibility of "misuse" of tough laws...

-The Hindu Lacking support for stringent provisions from parties,government comes up with consensus bill Under pressure from the Opposition, the Union Cabinet on Monday approved a diluted version of the bill dealing with sexual crimes against women. The new version will be introduced in the Lok Sabha on Tuesday. This was just hours after the UPA failed to convince opposition leaders, primarily the BJP, the Samajwadi Party, the Rashtriya Janata Dal and Janata...

-The Hindustan Times An all-party meeting convened by the government on Monday failed to reach a consensus on the anti-rape Bill with leaders expressing reservations on the age of consent for sex and demanding safeguards against misuse of the proposed law. "Largely there is consensus on the intent and the content of the Bill, except that there are concerns about misuse and abuse of some of the provisions of the Bill," Parliamentary...

-The Independent Hardliners defied as historic blueprint to tackle violence against girls and women is agreed at the United Nations A remarkable coalition of Conservative Muslim, Roman Catholic, and liberal Western countries have joined together to approve a historic United Nations blueprint to combat violence against women and girls. In doing so, they ignored strong objections from Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood that it clashed with Islamic principles and sought to destroy the family. But...