-NDTV Gadgets 360 After massive public outcry, the government has withdrawn a draft proposal that would have drastically altered how WhatsApp and other communication services would operate. Here is your 10-point cheatsheet to this big story: * The proposal (for a National Encryption Policy) was released for public feedback without his knowledge, said IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, acknowledging that it was poorly worded, and is being reworked. * The minister also...
More »SEARCH RESULT
Fix MGNREGS first, ‘smart villages’ can wait -KumKum Dasgupta
-Hindustan Times The Cabinet on Wednesday took two decisions that focus on rural India: First, it approved an additional 50 days of work for farmers/workers under the MGNREGS over and above the 100 days in areas where drought or natural calamities have been notified; and, second, it okayed a plan to develop a cluster of ‘smart villages’ to transform rural areas to economically, socially and physically sustainable spaces. The two decisions...
More »Is the Aadhar Card Compulsory? It’s Not Yet Clear -UPAsana Garnaik and Surabhi Shukla
-TheWire.in “It is not mandatory for a citizen to obtain an Aadhar card”, stated the Supreme Court on the 11th of August, 2015. The court was considering whether the Constitution guarantees a right to privacy and whether the Aadhar card scheme infringes such right. While the state argued that the legal position regarding the existence of the fundamental right to privacy is “doubtful”, the petitioners submitted that “it is too late...
More »Electricity for all — villages or households? -Debajit Palit
-The Hindu Business Line Even as village after village in India is ‘electrified’, many households within them, equal to the US population, are not The Prime Minister in his Independence Day speech reaffirmed the goal of “power for all” and said 18,500 villages which still have no electricity would be electrified within the next 1,000 days. The goal of complete electrification was first stated by the Rajadhyaksha committee on power in 1978...
More »Subverting the Land Acquisition Act, 2013 -Santosh Verma
-Economic and Political Weekly After coming to power in 2014, the National Democratic Alliance government took several measures to dilute the pro-poor provisions of the Land Acquisition Act of 2013. Though it has backed down, several questions remain over the way the Modi government has dealt with the issue of land acquisition. Santosh Verma (santosh.econ@gmail.com) is at the Council for Social Development, New Delhi. Land acquisition—by private corporations or the state—has raised vital...
More »