-The Times of India   Struggling to stay relevant amid signs of growing popular indifference, Team Anna chose Republic Day to advocate radical ideas like putting gram sabhas above the Lok Sabha and establishing a referendum commission along the lines of Election Commission.  In a video message, activist Anna Hazare also praised the Lokayukta bill of Uttarakhand, in what may be seen as a surrogate campaign for the BJP in the state. He...

Activists fear that the government’s move to exempt the CBI from the Right to Information Act could have ulterior motives Kiran Bedi is convinced that the UPA government’s reluctance to give the proposed citizen’s ombudsman, the Lokpal, control of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), the country’s premier investigation agency, is due to skeletons that lie buried deep in the agency’s cupboards.   The day Parliament was to discuss the Lokpal Bill,...

The government, the largest owner of landed property in the country, is preparing a comprehensive land sale policy to raise revenues and check corruption in government-owned property deals. The finance ministry will shortly move a cabinet note for bringing in a new uniform policy on 'land alienation' by government agencies, with an eye on removing discretionary powers of individual ministers and bureaucrats, said a government official. In big cities, large tracts...

-The Times of India   Accusing the state government of hatching a conspiracy of rendering them jobless, farmers of 50 villages of Indore district launched their protest against the government. The agitating farmers will gather at Kali Billod here on Friday under one umbrella the 'Kishan Shoshan Virodhi Manch' to intensify their protest where Team Anna member Medha Patkar will join them in the protest against land acquisition. The farmers are resisting the...

-IANS Jaunpur (Uttar Pradesh), Jan 9: Broken roads and power cuts have failed to deter people in their drive for education in this eastern Uttar Pradesh district. They have set up more than 30 schools and technical institutes for youth of the area. If you drive between Imran Ganj to Guraini in the Shahganj sub-division of the district -- a distance of some 10 km -- you can count about 40 schools...