-The Hindu The organising secretary of the All-India Forum for Right to Education, D. Ramesh Patnaik, has expressed fears that the much-debated legislation that promises universal education might end up facilitating greater commercialisation of education. Speaking at a Seminar here on Friday, organised by Karnataka Janashakti, he cited several provisions in the Right to Education (RTE) Act — such as paying for seats under quota in private schools rather than focusing on...

The Comptroller and Auditor General's final report on allocation of coal blocks between 2004 and 2009 without auction is expected to peg the value of "undue benefits" that the government extended to private entities alone at more than Rs 1.8 lakh crore, sources have indicated. The last draft of the report, first reported by TOI on March 22, had said the government extended undue benefits of Rs 10.67 lakh crore by...

-The Hindu All India Confederation of SC, ST Organisations, State unit, is organising a national Seminar here on June 17 to discuss implementation of reservations for Dalits in private sector and higher judiciary. The Seminar would also review recent Supreme Court's judgement against reservations in promotions. The meeting would be presided over by Udit Raj, who had earlier rallied SCs, STs across the country at Ramlila Grounds in New Delhi when the...

-The Times of India Government on Wednesday informed the Rajya Sabha that the home ministry had noted an instance where a foreigner was found to be extending his support to the CPI (Maoist) and its front organizations. It, however, added that there is "no direct evidence" to suggest that foreigners are engaged in an organized way to help the Maoists.  Referring to the instance, MoS for home affairs Jitendra Singh told the...

As the government scrambles to contain the political damage from the Ambedkar cartoon, one may be tempted to believe that somebody surreptitiously slipped Shankar's satirical work in the NCERT textbook. Or that the HRD ministry was caught unawares by the political heresy.  However, the fact is that the books were released by NCERT after having been thoroughly vetted by a National Monitoring Committee appointed by the ministry which includes several civil...