The $12 billion Posco investment in India was supposed to be the biggest FDI project in the country. After six years that still remains on paper Horangineun jugeumyeon gajugeul namgigo, Sarameun jugeumyun ireumeul namginda (When tigers die, they leave behind leather. When people die, they leave their names behind) —Old Korean Proverb The news flash from Press Trust of India came on July 10, 2011. Posco, the $32 billion South Korean steel giant had decided to...

-The Economic Times   The Supreme Court on Friday refused to ease its three-month old ban on the manufacture, sale and use of pesticide endosulfan despite an expert committee report favouring lifting the restrictions for all states except the worst-affected Kerala and Karnataka. However, a bench of Chief Justice S H Kapadia and Justices K S Radhakrishnan and Swatanter Kumar agreed to consider the industry's request for permission to export the...

The Lokpal Bill is in danger of skidding off the rails. As it is introduced in Parliament, eminent activist Aruna Roy tells Shoma Chaudhury why we should not rush into it. THE LOKPAL BILL is now being debated in Parliament, almost 40 years after the idea was first mooted. Unfortunately, parented on one side by decades of wilful government inertia and, on the other, by the panicked hustle of ‘Team...

Taking on HRD minister Kapil Sibal, Team Anna on Monday released the interim results of its 'referendum' in the minister's constituency of Chandni Chowk which showed 85% of respondents were against the government-proposed Lokpal Bill. The civil society activists question whether Sibal still represented the "aspirations of his people" since the results contradicted whatever he had been saying in joint committee meetings held earlier to draft the anti-corruption Bill. Anna and his...

It’s been raining “rights” in Indian policy for the last few years — education, work, food, service, healthcare, and much else. This “Diet Coke” approach to poverty reduction — the sweetness without the calories — was always dangerous because of unknown side effects. Commenting in 1790 on the consequences of the French Revolution, Edmund Burke said: “They have found their punishment in their success. Laws overturned, tribunals subverted, industry without...