If you were a tad worried about the government`s intentions to censor free speech by controlling the internet and monitoring your access to the Web through a vague and draconian legal framework - `IT Rules, 2011`, followed by an attempt to pre-screen content on Google and Facebook - you haven`t seen anything yet. In mid-2011, the success of the internet and social media in bringing down dictatorships in Egypt and Libya...

In South Mumbai's upscale Malabar Hill, a neighbourhood of 6,000 people share 52 toilets, 26 for men and 26 for women. That works out to around 115 people per toilet. Nearby live some of the oldest and richest families of the city with homes where one person may have a choice of many toilets. But this is Simla Nagar, where 720 households are precariously perched on a not so wealthy slope...

Ankaji Bhai Gangar, a 49-year-old subsistence farmer, stood in line in this remote village until, for the first time in his life, he squinted into the soft glow of a computer screen. His name, year of birth and address were recorded. A worker guided Mr. Gangar’s rough fingers to the glowing green surface of a scanner to record his fingerprints. He peered into an iris scanner shaped like binoculars that...

The Supreme Court directs the Tamil Nadu government to implement the uniform system of school education immediately. “Children are not only the future citizens but also the future of the earth. Elders in general, and parents and teachers in particular, owe a responsibility for taking care of the well-being and welfare of the children. The world shall be a better or worse place to live according to how we treat...

DESPITE WHAT our reel-life heroes have shown us, perhaps it’s only possible to fight one villain at a time. Still, in his last few days on the job, Karnataka Lokayukta Santosh Hegde tried to battle two evils, with two reports that presented damning evidence of corruption in the BJP government. The first report, on illegal mining, had enough firepower to systematically dig holes in the state government. The second report,...