-The Hindu The Indian police continue to torture suspects in custody as they are rarely punished On October 13, 2019, Pradeep Tomar, a security guard, rushed with his 10-year-old son to Pilkhua police station in Hapur district in Uttar Pradesh. He had been summoned for interrogation in connection with a murder case. The son later said that his father was brutally tortured by the policemen in front of him for hours. When...

-The Hindu Minister for Communications justifies imposition of Internet blockade in Jammu and Kashmir New Delhi: Minister for Communications Ravi Shankar Prasad on Thursday justified the imposition of Internet blockade in Jammu and Kashmir by stating that national security trumped over the right to use the Internet and the blockade would be reviewed periodically based on the law and order situation in the region. Mr. Prasad, who was answering a question in the...

-Decoding the Priorities: An Analysis of Union Budget 2020-21, Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability (CBGA), February 2020 The publication presents an analysis of the priorities in Union Budget 2020-21, both on public expenditure and resource mobilisation front. It has been divided broadly into five chapters. The first chapter focuses on a host of important aspects under Resource Mobilisation, like domestic tax policy, international taxation policy, financial transparency, and Centre-State...

  The Union Budget 2020-21, which was presented by the Finance Minister Smt. Nirmala Sitharaman on 1st February, 2020 has failed to impress civil society activists and farmers' Rights groups (click here  and here). Through their press releases and notes, members of CSOs were demanding as well as suggesting the Union Government for hiking the budgetary allocation for schemes like Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) and Pradhan Mantri...

-Down to Earth Governments in India define farmers as those who own land, which is usually not the case with women Women farmers from six states demanded a comprehensive agriculture policy that would recognise them and offer relief and compensation to the kin of male farmers who had commit suicide, at a recent event in the national capital. Around 60 women farmers from Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Punjab took...