To say that no one has elected Anna Hazare, Arvind Kejriwal and the rest to speak for ordinary citizens is to say the obvious. The mostly middle-class people and the chatteratti (film stars, celebrity cops and so on) who have rallied to Mr Hazare’s cause remind one of the people who held hands and lit candles after the November 2008 terrorist attack on Mumbai, saying, “Enough is enough”. TV stations...

The burgeoning movement against corruption set off by social activist Anna Hazare appears to be turning into an undemocratic battle for power without votes or elections, sections of Indian economists and sociologists have said. Tens of thousands of Indians across the country have pLEDged their alliance with the movement LED by Hazare —from schoolchildren yanked by teachers out of classes to slogan-shouting municipal workers, from preachers to actors to lawyers. But some...

With an eye on Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh early next year, Vilasrao Deshmukh’s Rural Development Ministry appears to have decided to pin down the Mayawati-LED BSP government over the implementation of the UPA’s flagship rural job guarantee scheme (NREGS) in the state. The Rural Development Ministry has constituted a 10-member committee to look into loopholes in the implementation of the scheme in the pocket boroughs of Congress president Sonia Gandhi...

Government on Friday night blinked in the battle of attrition with Anna Hazare by agreeing to issue a formal order to set up a joint committee for drafting an effective Lokpal Bill and the Gandhian will end his indefinite fast on Saturday. The announcement of an agreement came from both sides late in the night on the fourth day of Hazare's last-unto-death that triggered a nationwide support for his anti-corruption campaign. "Government...

For 55-year-old Mohimuddin of Goroimari, which falls in the Chaygaon Assembly constituency in lower Assam's Kamrup district, the protection of minorities from undue harassment in the name of identification of foreigners was the prime issue until a few years ago. This time round, he is more worried about the backwardness of his village coupLED with price hike. A poor peasant with seven mouths to feed, Mohimuddin says the prime demand of...