A protest by thousands of farmers against alleged forced acquisition of land has spread to parts of the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. Two policemen and a farmer were killed in weekend clashes, during protests in the Greater Noida region against the acquisition of land by the government for a new motorway. The government denies that the land has been forcibly acquired from farmers. The use of land for industrial purposes is...

Even as the highest ever harvest of wheat and rice is expected this year, callous administration is leading to rice literally going up in smoke in the Punjab. Tens of thousands of tons of rice stocked for the last five years in the open have now caught fire at a Punjab Agro storage area in Khamano, a large procurement market.   An incensed Supreme Court had in 2010 said if the government...

The draft bill seeks to create an institution that will be independent of those it seeks to police, and will have powers to investigate and prosecute all public servants, and others found guilty of corrupting them. A number of commentators have raised issues about the provisions in the draft of the Jan Lokpal Bill. They have asked whether it would be an effective instrument to check corruption. They have pointed to...

The issue of acquiring farmland for industry is threatening to jolt West Bengal's Left Front, the world's longest-running democratically elected Communist government, says Sumit Bhattacharya A confidential digital map shows exactly how many land owners had taken the compensation, how many had taken partial compensation, and how many had refused to part with their land for the botched Tata Nano plant in Singur, West Bengal. The map -- based on Global...

For 55-year-old Mohimuddin of Goroimari, which falls in the Chaygaon Assembly constituency in lower Assam's Kamrup district, the protection of minorities from undue harassment in the name of identification of foreigners was the prime issue until a few years ago. This time round, he is more worried about the backwardness of his village coupled with price hike. A poor peasant with seven mouths to feed, Mohimuddin says the prime demand of...