-The Telegraph The Supreme Court today took cognisance of a public interest petition about alleged extra-judicial killings of unarmed nationals by the Border Security Force along the Bengal stretch of the border with Bangladesh. A two-judge bench of Justices K.S. Radhakrishnan and Dipak MIShra issued notices to the Centre and the Bengal government after hearing short arguments from senior counsel Colin Gonsalves for the Banglar Manabadhikar Suraksha Mancha, an NGO that filed...

-The Telegraph The Supreme Court today asked Gujarat to submit a list, if any, of religious structures damaged in the 2002 riots as the state dug in its heels and declared its intention not to pay for the repair of these structures. A two-judge bench, comprising Justices K.S. Radhakrishnan and Dipak MIShra, adjourned the matter for further hearing on July 30 but not before it declared its intention to examine whether a...

-The Telegraph Ranchi: Faced with an imminent Jharkhand High Court hearing on the progress made at Nagri where three premier educational institutes are coming up, a cornered state government has planned a desperate defence to counter allegations of MIShandling the issue and escalating the battle of ownership of 227 acres. According to sources, the government will tell the court of a plan to set up police barracks at the construction sites of...

Model community forestry initiatives in Orissa are defying Forest Department efforts to control and exploit the region’s forests. ‘Heaven is a forest of miles and miles of Mohua trees / And hell is a forest of miles and miles of Mohua trees with a forest guard in it!’ Thus goes a song of the Muria Adivasis in the forests of Bastar in central India. Encapsulated in this simple expression, however, is...

With the threat of a failed monsoon and an impending drought, the need for public works and for greater numbers of workers will arise in many states, says National Advisory Council member Aruna Roy Despite all its seminal achievements, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Gurantee Act is at the receiving end of the most controversial critiques any government programme has received so far. We could perhaps invert this to say...