Difficult times call for difficult measures. Pushed into a corner by an unsustainable fiscal deficit and various sectors and programs (including the proposed food security legislation) screaming for a greater share of the budget pie, the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government in India has been forced to do what it might not have otherwise—reduce its marquee job guarantee scheme’s allocation in a big way for the first time.  In one...

-The Hindu Sleuths from the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) conducted searches in 12 locations in Lucknow district on Saturday in connection with the multi-crore foodgrains scam in Uttar Pradesh. The scam relates to sale of wheat and rice — meant for distribution to the poor — in the black market from 2002 to 2007, and was estimated to be of the order of around Rs. 35,000 crore. The locations included those in...

PROFESSOR Shamnad Basheer joined the National University of Juridical Sciences (NUJS), Kolkata, in November 2008 as the first Ministry of Human Resource Development Chaired Professor in Intellectual Property Law. Before this, he was Frank H. Marks Visiting Associate Professor of Intellectual Property Law at the George Washington University law school and a research associate at the Oxford Intellectual Property Research Centre (OIPRC).  He is the founder of several initiatives, including...

As part of its efforts to forecast monsoon better, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) will incorporate readings from one of the latest US climate forecast models that is being improved for Indian conditions. IMD will release its monsoon forecast for this year in the middle of next week, while weather experts from South Asia gathered in Pune will come out with their forecast for the South Asian region on Friday. Advanced countries...

Rural India has been denied access to globalisation, penalising farmers and farm labour. For the farmer, the government's policy is best described as Dhritarashtra's embrace. After the Mahabharata war was over, the old king met his NEPhews, the victorious Pandavas, and embraced them, one by one, in a gesture of forgiving and affection. When, Bhima's turn came, the loving embrace was so tight that it crushed a metal dummy of the second...