Although India is a labour-surplus economy – with an unlimited number of workers willing to work at a subsistence wage – a paradoxical feature of the labour market is the rising incidence of scarcity or shortages amid a situation of potential plenty. No doubt, this pertains to skilled labour. But when 15 per cent of Indian trucks are idle owing to a shortage of drivers or India Inc is worried...

Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi’s alleged instructions to his officials to allow Hindus to vent their anger after the Godhra attack may not amount to conspiracy to murder but could form the basis of prosecution under various Sections including 153 A, 153 B, 505 and 166 of the IPC.   These deal with statements promoting enmity between communities, imputations and assertions prejudicial to national integration, statements conducing to public mischief, and public...

More than 460 people, mostly children, have died after a fresh outbreak of encephalitis in northern India. The BBC's Sanjoy Majumder travelled to Gorakhpur in Uttar Pradesh to find out why the town is struggling to cope with the disease. Ward number 12 at Gorakhpur's main hospital is overflowing with sick children, two or three squeezed into a single bed. Many of them are visibly sick and are having to be administered...

Omar appeasing radical political elements in the State, says Bhan Amid reports of the Defence Ministry's opposition to the withdrawal of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA) from certain areas in Jammu and Kashmir, the Congress, the main ally of the Omar Abdullah-led coalition government in the State, also voiced its reservations. The party also repeated its demand for rotational Chief Ministership after completion of three years of the present...

Infant deaths resulting from a recent clinical trial in India have led to a media outcry. But few have considered how explosive these revelations actually are, or the problematic use and application of the Right to Information Act. When India’s Right to Information Act came into force in 2005, the legislation’s text acknowledged the conflict that could arise from revealing certain information, pointing out that there was a need to ‘harmonise’...