A group of villagers sit on a shaded platform on a hot afternoon in Mirche village. The topic of discussion today is the Mongra barrage - a dam-like structure constructed on the nearby Shivnath river. The conversation is animated. The villagers discuss the displacement the barrage has caused and the lack of compensation from the authorities. "It's been four years since the dam was built. Where is our compensation," asks...

INSIDE his hovel of branches and rags, a grizzled pauper called Badshah Kale keeps a precious object. It is a note, scrawled by a policeman and framed by Mr Kale, proclaiming that he “is not a thief”. For members of his Pardhi tribe, who are among some 60m Indians considered criminal by tradition, this is treasure. Squatting beside Mr Kale, on a turd-strewn wasteland outside Ashti, a village in India’s western...

The fear of khap looms large over Haryana with 40 members of the Dalit (Valmiki) community at Mirchpur village in Hisar district — where two people were burnt alive by Jats last week — fleeing their homes, rattled by khap support of Jat violence against them. Their fears were compounded on Sunday when, in a khap meeting in Jind, 300 khap representatives called for intensifying the agitation against the Hindu...

At least 70 Lok Sabha MPs, including former prime minister HD Deve Gowda, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief Lalu Prasad and cricketer-turned-politician Navjot Singh Sidhu, have not yet disclosed details of their assets, a Right to Information (RTI) application has revealed. The information was obtained in reply to an application filed by RTI activist Subhash Chandra Agrawal with the Lok Sabha secretariat, seeking names of the members who have not...

Reveals survey by Centre for Environment and Food Security in 50 villages of Bundelkhand  “Dalit households not getting single day of work” “Scheme is a failure in the remote areas of Bundelkhand” An independent survey has revealed that implementation of the much talked about Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) in 50 villages across the drought-hit Bundelkhand region has been rather tardy and mired in corruption with most Dalit households...