-The Hindu Certain section of population seeks relaxation of ban on tourism; specialists are against any dilution of the scheme The Tamil Nadu Government’s latest notifications on demarcation of core and buffer zones of three tiger reserves in the State may still require a fine-tuning to strike a balance among ecology protection, tribal welfare and tourism promotion, feel conservationists and wildlife experts. As the demand for relaxation of the ban on tourism becomes...

-The Hindu The Constitution of India operates in happy harmony with the instrumentalities of the executive and the legislature. But to be truly great, the judiciary exercising democratic power must enjoy independence of a high order. But independence could become dangerous and undemocratic unless there is a constitutional discipline with rules of good conduct and accountability: without these, the robes may prove arrogant. It is in this context that Chief Justice S.H....

-Mail Online India Concerned over the rigidity of some provisions of the Right to Education Act, members of the National Advisory Council (NAC) are working on a report recommending review of the norms and standards laid down for schools under the legislation. The NAC, led by Congress chief Sonia Gandhi, has been advising the central government on the effective implementation of the provisions of the RTE Act. Calling the Act as excessively 'input-driven',...

-Pratirodh Bureau Activists led by Narmada Bachao Andolan leader Medha Patkar have alleged that the much awaited Land Acquisition Bill was actually a "diluted version" of the Standing Committee's recommended bill.   The activists under belonging to various groups, including National Alliance of People’s Movements, National Forum of Forest people and Forest Workers, Kisan Sangharsh Samiti and Sangharsh claimed that the "positive" position taken by the Standing Committee had been diluted by the...

-The Times of India NAGPUR: The state education department has moved into an aggressive mode on learning that 10 lakh students have ditched government schools (zilla parishad and corporation) and shifted to private institutions in the last five years. The revelation came from Sanjay Deshmukh, director of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan (SSA) and the man leading RTE implementation in Maharashtra. "Five years ago we had about 78 lakh students, now the figure has...