-Hindustan Times When right to information activist Guru Prasad Shukla was beaten to death by fellow villagers last month, he became the 39th person to lay down his life for exercising the transparency law in its first decade. Another 275 people have reportedly been assaulted or harassed for invoking the law to raise uncomfortable questions before those in power. The 50-year-old Shukla had sought information about development work in his village and...
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Fence-sitter Six in land bill spotlight -Basant Kumar Mohanty
-The Telegraph New Delhi: Six of the 30 MPs on the joint parliamentary committee examining the land acquisition bill appear undecided, with the BJP hoping to woo them and gain a majority on the panel. The score is now tied 12-12, which means the government needs the support of at least four of the six remaining members, who have so far kept their cards close to their chest. These half-dozen are from the...
More »SCs in TN better off than FCs in Jharkhand -Rukmini S
-The Hindu National averages hide State-level dynamics; SCs, STs worse off on average. New data from the Socio Economic and Caste Census (SECC) 2011 and the UNICEF’s Rapid Survey on Children (RSOC) show that while India’s Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes have worse socio-economic indicators, this disadvantage is varies substantially depending on the State where they live. So SC and ST children in Tamil Nadu and Kerala are less likely to be underweight...
More »Here's why India may be on the brink of an unprecedented full-blown water crisis -Rahul Sachitanand & Sandhya Ravishankar
-The Economic Times A steel wheelchair occupies pride of place in the home of A Swami, a resident of Kottala village in Nalgonda district of Telangana. When you walk into the small two-room dwelling, you immediately see why. Swami is barely a couple of feet tall, with an outsize head and a shrunken body. He contracted fluorosis as a baby and that stunted both his mental and physical progress. The government's balm...
More »Govt sets rooftop solar targets for States -G Balachandar
-The Hindu Chennai: The Central government has recently set State-wise tentative targets for installation of grid-connected solar rooftop systems as part of its plan to achieve 40,000 MW of rooftop solar power by 2022. Under the plan, Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh are expected to add higher capacities at 4,700 MW and 4,300 MW, respectively. Tamil Nadu and Gujarat have been given a target of 3,500 MW and 3,200 MW, respectively. Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh,...
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