-The Indian Express Dhule: For 33 years, Deputy Tehsildar Abdul Halim Ansari worked for the state, never doubting that it was largely fair, just and honest towards all citizens. That perception changed on Sunday, after his 30-year-old son died before his eyes, allegedly gunned down by the orders of the same administration that he has served all his life. Ansari, 58, believes that the police shot his son in cold blood. He...

-The Telegraph A Youth Congress member handpicked by Rahul Gandhi today sought an explanation from the party-led government in Maharashtra why Bal Thackeray was cremated with state honours. In his plea filed under the Right to Information Act, Abdul Hafiz Gandhi, who shares his surname with the Congress leader, also wanted to know how the Shiv Sena was given permission to hold their late patriarch’s funeral at Shivaji Park, a public place. The...

-The Telegraph Srinagar: If appetite for capital punishment has been whetted in the country, Padshah Begum’s experience today should serve as a timely note of caution. The 60-year-old lady in Srinagar received word this afternoon that Delhi High Court has taken her son off death row because “serious lapses” marked the police investigation into a blast in the capital in 1996. She is no stranger to such news: two years ago, her eldest...

-The Indian Express The Bangladesh High Commission has complained to the Indian government that two Bangladeshi citizens have been implicated in crimes committed in Delhi when they weren’t even in India. The two Bangladeshis, aged 22 and 60, have been held as undertrials in Tihar jail for nearly four and three years respectively. According to documents presented in two Delhi courts, both men arrived in India several months after their alleged crimes...

-The Indian Express Firebrand leader who rose swiftly till downfall She rose swiftly through the ranks, having made her mark as a firebrand leader who had saffron politics as part of her legacy. Mayaben Surendrabhai Kodnani, convicted of murder, conspiracy and spreading communal hatred, is the daughter of a staunch RSS worker who had suffered the pains of Partition, moving from Tharparkar in Sind province to Deesa in Gujarat. Kodnani, the first sitting...