The railway ministry is helpless about the discomfort of railway passengers in reserved compartments who are outnumbered by passengers without tickets or with tickets meant for unreserved compartments   Last month, my friend’s daughter went on a trip to Corbett Park, which was organised by a Pune-based nature trail group. Although they had booked a Second Class (ordinary) reserved compartment, most of the 30-hour journey was spent in utter discomfort, with people...

-The Times of India Seventeen months after it registered a FIR (first information report) in the Adarsh society scam, the CBI on Wednesday filed a chargesheet against 13 politicians, bureaucrats and retired military officers. The case involving the 31-storeyed tower in tony Colaba had led to a chief minister stepping down and seven high-profile personalities, including a former BMC chief and retired military officers, getting arrested.  The charges filed were for criminal...

-The Hindu Lack of irrigation found to be one of the major causes of farmer suicides Lack of irrigation is one of the major causes leading to cotton farmer suicides in Maharashtra, a new study by the Council of Social Development (CSD) has stated. Titled ‘Socio-economic impact assessment of Bt cotton in India,’ the study has yet again raised the question of whether the marginal land of Vidarbha is suited for Bt...

A narrow education is making engineers oblivious to the importance of human interaction and raising the cost of even simple tasks My time in South Asia has rewarded me with an enigma: why is engineering so expensive here? Why is it often many times more expensive than in Australia, my home? My search for answers led me to shanty towns on the fringes of mega-cities. We compared an award winning Indian factory...

-The Indian Express Only the names of the patients have changed. Acute encephalitis syndrome is back in Bihar, hitting the same districts as every year, its victims once again mostly children of Mahadalit communities living in various degrees of poverty, their resistance levels lowered by malnutrition and exposure to heat. And the government response has been repetitive to the point of being ritualistic. It has asked for Central assistance and set up...