-The Telegraph New Delhi: Top-notch foreign universities are looking to set foot in India to do research but not to open degree programmes, a trend local academics allege is aimed at identifying and luring away Indian talent instead of grooming it. The latest to join the bandwagon is the University of Chicago. It today announced plans for an "India Centre" in Delhi that will start operating from March and look to start...

India's landmark Right to Information Legislation is called the biggest single step since independence to build transparency in governance. However, its remarkable success is owed only to just 0.3 per cent of Indians who file RTI applications. It's anybody's guess as to what would be the impact if even one or two per cent of Indians began to ask tough questions to hold their rulers accountable. It is noteworthy that...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The National Commission for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes has ordered the Uttar Pradesh government to pay Rs 1 lakh as compensation to the family of a tribal maidservant from Jharkhand, whose body was found hanging at her employer's Kaushambi home in Ghaziabad this June. The commission issued this directive after a detailed hearing of the case in which senior officials of Jharkhand state anti-trafficking unit and UP...

-The Hindu Mining companies have received favourable impact assessments even as they do great damage to the environment because regulators are willing to look the other way Last week, world leaders concerned about economic development got together at the International Monetary Fund, and gave a series of most instructive interviews. Our Finance Minister, P. Chidambaram, said that his problem was the slowing down of India's economic growth and reduction in government revenues....

-PTI Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has joined government and PSU oil firms against the Supreme Court order making Aadhaar card not mandatory for availing social benefits saying, its directive has "very serious implications" in the implementation of welfare schemes. The UIDAI also contended that its order dated September 23, putting the onus on it to check that Aadhaar card should not be given to illegal immigrants, impinges on the jurisdiction...