-Live Mint Dominant caste groups in the state have found their own ways to capture and preserve power Dravidian political parties, which came into existence with the objective of achieving social equality, have been in power for more than four decades in Tamil Nadu, yet caste-based discrimination against the Dalits has remained a fact of life in the southern state. That's in contrast with neighbouring Kerala, which has emerged as a...

-The Times of India AHMEDABAD: It was Rajkumar pandian's day out. The suspended IPS officer who has been arrested in two of the most sensitive fake encounters of Gujarat - Sohrabuddin Sheikh and Tulsiram Prajapati - was allowed to go home without any police escorts on Sunday night. This nocturnal jaunt was caught on camera by a local news TV channel on Sunday. Before going home, he even spent some time...

-PTI panAJI: Sitting on the Mandovi river bank here, where he has set up his maiden Goa show of the 107-year-old Touring Talkies, Vijay Kulkarni has mixed feelings. He is excited about the fact that this is the first time time that the Touring Talkies has traveled outside Maharashtra. "But this may be the last time too," says 65-year-old Kulkarni, the owner of Sri Ram Touring Talkies and Vijay Touring Talkies. According to him,...

-The Business Standard The Novartis verdict by the Supreme Court emphasised the importance of flexibilities in drug patent laws, in contrast to Western countries which are seeking TRIPS-plus hardening through free-trade agreements As curtains on the six-year-long legal tussle with Swiss drug giant Novartis AG finally came down earlier this month, the Indian government did not waste a second in hailing the Indian patent law which it said was in "full...

-The United Nations The Asia-Pacific region, which has overtaken the rest of the world in consumption of raw materials as affluence and manufacturing increase, must boost its resource efficiency or risk losing ground in lifestyle, economic growth and environmental sustainability, according to a UN report released today. From 1970-2008, consumption of construction minerals increased 13.4 times, metal ores and industrial minerals consumption 8.6, fossil fuels 5.4, and biomass 2.7 times, according to...