-IANS The Rajya Sabha Tuesday took up the issue of drought-like situation in several parts of the country, with opposition members demanding immediate action as well as long term plan for tackling this natural calamity. Raising a calling attention motion on the drought-like situation in Karnataka, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader M. Venkaiah Naidu slammed the government for its "lax" and "insensitive" attitude towards the issue even as crops in Karnataka have...

Aruna Roy is in Delhi, not as a member of the National Advisory Council (NAC) but as a social activist. Roy, under the banner of Pension Parishad, is spearheading a national campaign at Jantar Mantar demanding a universal pension scheme for senior citizens in India. A move that could cost the government around Rs 2 lakh crore per annum, the proposal will cover more than eight crore senior citizens. The...

-The Hindustan Times In a jolt to Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi, a Supreme Court-appointed lawyer's report on the post-Godhra 2002 riots has held that he can be prosecuted for "promoting enmity among different groups". Amicus curiae (friend of the court) Raju Ramachandran's report, made public on Monday,  on a complaint by riot victim Zakia Jafri, differs from the clean chit given to Modi by the SC-appointed special investigation team (SIT) last...

-Zee News Raisen: Protests over wheat procurement and shortage of jute bags at Bareli town near here took a violent turn on Monday with a farmer killed in police firing and about 40 farmers and some officials injured. An indefinite curfew has been imposed in the town. Former sarpanch Hari Singh Prajapati was killed in police firing while three others sustained bullet injuries, police said. Raisen Collector Mohanlal Meena and SP...

-The Business Standard Without policy correctives, a water crisis is inevitable In a future India, urban neighbourhoods might well be racked by internecine battles over water. The main reason to fear this dystopia is the astonishing rates at which groundwater is being sucked up from below the earth in this country. Groundwater finds a home in natural aquifers, layers of rock, clay and sand far underground. For thousands of years, Indians...