-Outlook Allying fears that opening up of the retail sector for FDI will hurt small kirana shops, Plan Panel Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia today said modern retail is an expanding segment and it would more than double in a very short time. "I don't think FDI in retail is threat to small retailers. Modern retail is the expanding segment. Those who say that the small sector would be hurt, I think...

Between 2009 and February 2011, at least 14 people were charged with sedition in India London: The typical citizen could be forgiven for fearing that the world’s largest democracy is hurtling towards George Orwell’s 1984 rather than 2013. In late August the government’s department of telecommunications, citing the “communal tensions” around Assam, blocked more than 300 individual web addresses, including the Twitter profile pages of some journalists. It also ordered a limit...

-The Hindu PM’s statement that seven States are naxal-affected is at variance with Home Ministry’s figure How many States are affected by left-wing extremism? The answer could vary, if one is to go by official statements made at different times. Addressing the annual conference of the DGPs/IGPs in Delhi on Saturday, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said seven States were affected. He spoke about the “ability of left-wing extremists in increasing their numbers and...

-The Economic Times The monsoon session that ends on Friday will enter the hall of shame as the second least productive session of the 15th Parliament with legislators having worked for only a quarter of the scheduled time. Only four bills were passed in the month-long session leaving a backlog of more than 100 pending legislations, some as old as 25 years old. According to data analysed by PRS Legislative Research, Lok Sabha...

-The Times of India The judiciary-government tussle over code of conduct for judges is far from over. Though the government has decided to give statutory status to the Code of Conduct evolved by the Supreme Court in 1997, law minister Salman Khurshid on Thursday said this does not mean judiciary will be free to comment on constitutional authorities in open court. The government is firm on introducing a specific provision in the...