-The Economic Times Pharmaceutical multinationals have begun using the Right to Information law to launch pre-emptive legal action against local generic players to protect the market of patented drugs and delay the entry of low cost generic medicines in the 60,000-crore domestic drug market. MNCs are using such information to sue generic firms even at a stage when their marketing approval is still pending or during the few months' window between the...

-The Hindu There is little doubt that US universities have a long way to go in terms of making women safe on campus In the wake of the high-profile gang rape incident in New Delhi on December 16, media and public comments have significantly centred on anti-woman attitudes in Indian society, particularly among young men. This line of introspection is indeed warranted, for there can be little doubt that these values have fuelled...

-The Times of India The government is all set to crack the whip on India's shameful pharma-doctor nexus. The National Development Council (NDC), led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, will meet on December 27 to discuss bringing a legislation requiring drug companies to mandatorily disclose payments made to doctors for research, consulting, lectures, travel and entertainment. Doctors involved in ghost writing to promote pharma products will also be disqualified. The official NDC document...

-The Hindu The view that it will deter rape is misplaced and based on a narrow, sexual intercourse-definition of the crime There is a fascinating urban legend that Apple’s logo is dedicated to Alan Turing, who committed suicide by biting into a cyanide injected apple. A few years after he was instrumental in breaking the German Enigma code in World War II, Alan Turing was convicted in 1952 for homosexual acts in...

-The Times of India Days after a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court said it was time to revisit jurisprudence behind imposition of death penalty, the apex court asked the Union government why provisions in some laws mandating compulsory death penalty as punishment be not struck down as unconstitutional. The question from a bench of Justices Aftab Alam and Ranajana Desai put additional solicitor general Siddharth Luthra in a piquant position for...