-The Hindu Trend is towards control of content The production of media content and its distribution are becoming increasingly combined and concentrated in the hands of a few, finds the Media Ownership Monitor (MOM), a research project carried out in India over the past six months by Reporters Without Borders and the Delhi-based digital media company DataLEADS. The study, presented in Delhi on Wednesday, also assesses the media space as a narrow one,...

-Down to Earth Reflections on Supreme Court order to evict ‘illegitimate’ tribals from the forests There is an ominous significance to the February 13, 2019 order of the Supreme Court on “illegitimate” forest-dwellers. When we first heard of it, we felt a rising dismay and shock at this judicial legitimation of unparalleled atrocity against the tribals. The order is nothing less than the final legitimised expropriation of the tribal communities (poor landless)...

-The Hindu Business Line Many countries have introduced Title Guarantee Acts to end uncertainty, duplication of land title deeds and endless disputes over the ownership of land holdings. Hyderabad: Farmers' unions and activists, on Tuesday, have asked the Telangana government to conduct a comprehensive survey of the land in the state before proceeding with the Title Guarantee Act. They said that the the state government should also introduce an exclusive Act to deal...

-Livemint.com The BJP enjoyed greater support among upper caste-dominated affluent districts in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections than in other districts of the country One of the notable features of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s historic victory in 2014 was its ability to attract support across social groups, cutting across traditional divides of caste and class. Yet, support for the party was much greater among certain demographic groups than among others, a Mint...

-The Hindu It is shocking that a democratic government is seeking to strengthen the colonial-era Indian Forest Act The Indian Forest Act, 1927 was a remarkable piece of expropriation in the name of conservation. The British government carried out one of the largest land expropriations in history, where the rights to occupy and use forests were transferred from communities with customary and historical property rights to the colonial Central government. The act...