Pooja Gujjar is the consummate politician. She’s quick-witted and outspoken, and, as her every-ready, dimpled smile suggests, always up for a challenge. She has, admittedly, a girlish streak. The first time she stood for election she chose as her symbol a flower. And although she lost, to a boy, she’s proud that all the girls voted for her. Pooja is the deputy “sarpanch” – Hindi for leader – of her school’s...

Can Information Technology Act deal with the dynamics of the Net? THIS is one series of court cases the nation is following keenly. Within one week, in December last year, a criminal and a civil complaint were filed against 20-odd online giants like Google, Facebook, Microsoft and Yahoo for hosting anti-religious and anti-social content on their websites. While the judge hearing the civil case ordered immediate removal and blockade of all...

Eureka Forbes, known for its water purifiers, is now out to banish darkness from Indian villages with its solar lighting products. Its Eurodiya brand of solar bulbs are made with US-based Nokero (short for ‘no kerosene’) that makes affordable solar bulbs, panels and chargers for communities that have no access to electricity. Over 85,000 villages (or 63% of rural India) are without electricity. Eurodiya is expected to be an alternative to...

-The Telegraph CPM leader Lakshman Seth has been accused of murder in a CID chargesheet over the disappearance of six anti-land acquisition protesters during the party’s recapture of Nandigram in November 2007. The chargesheet, submitted to the Haldia sub-divisional court around 5.10pm, also names 87 other CPM leaders and workers. “Seth has been mentioned in the chargesheet as an accused who is absconding,” a senior CID official said. Hours after the CID submitted the...

The government’s recent actions in notifying the Intermediary Guidelines for the internet with minimal public debate have resulted in the creation of a legal system that raises as many problems as it solves. The regulations as presently notified are arguably unconstitutional, arbitrary and vague and could pose a serious problem to the business of various intermediaries in the country (not to mention hampering internet penetration in the country) and also...