-The Hindu The Supreme Court's ruling on the requirement of previous sanction to prosecute soldiers accused of committing crimes may have clarified matters as far as the legal provisions of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act are concerned but for the families of the five innocent men who were killed in a fake encounter at Pathribal, Jammu and Kashmir, in March 2000, it is still not clear whether or not they...

LUCKNOW: In a significant order passed by the Central Information Commission, inspection reports of banks can be disclosed under the RTIAct. And, the Reserve Bank of India cannot deny disclosing the report stating that it can have ill-effects on the economy. The CIC's order came in a case pertaining to Kanpur-based United Mercantile Cooperative Bank Ltd. in its order, the CIC stated that the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) should disclose...

The man selected by the Maoist captors of Chhattisgarh collector Alex Paul Menon to mediate with the government today said the abduction was part of a “war” over resources but voiced hope that the officer would be freed. “The abduction is situational, it depends on what is happening there,” B.D. Sharma said, drawing attention to what the rebels brand as state-sponsored atrocities on tribals. The comments, four days after the rebels snatched...

For three days in the last week of March, the United States Supreme Court heard arguments on the Affordable Care Act. No Federal law in the U.S. in recent memory has aroused such bitter controversy. If it is struck down as unconstitutional, President Barack Obama's prestige will suffer. He is due for re-election in November. Very many think the court will rule against him in June. The core of the law...

Imagine you are a citizen racing across newspapers rapid fire. As you flip the pages you run across events like the Vedanta mining case, the Koodankulam nuclear controversy, the debate on poverty and reports about climate change. Each of these can be a life-threatening event and none of them have a life support system of knowledge which allows them to be debated in the open. The basic information comes from...