-The Hindu The conviction rate for every kind of crime is in free fall, engendering a breakdown of law that no republic can survive Even criminals, back in 1953, seemed to be soaking in the warm, hope-filled glow that suffused the newly free India. From a peak of 654,019 in 1949, the number of crimes had declined year-on-year to 601,964. Murderers and dacoits; house-breakers and robbers — all were showing declining enthusiasm...

-The Indian Express After QS and Times Higher Education published their rankings of universities across the world, higher education has become the subject of fierce debate in India. The highest ranking institutions from India are the IITs, but even these do not figure in the top 200. The general refrain — why does no Indian university find a place among the top global universities? Unfortunately, given our present policies on higher education...

-Economic and Political Weekly The recent Comptroller and Auditor General's report on the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board and, more broadly, on nuclear safety regulation has highlighted many serious organisational and operational flaws. The report follows on a series of earlier CAG reports that documented cost and time overruns and poor performance at a number of nuclear facilities in the country. On the whole, the CAG reports offer a powerful indictment of...

-The Hindustan Times In June 1992, Manmohan Singh, then finance minister in the Government of India, delivered the Foundation Day Address of the Society for Promotion of Wastelands Development (SPWD). He spoke on the topic ‘Environment and the New Economic Policies’. In his talk, Singh urged “objective standards industry-wise for safeguarding the environment, asking industry to certify compliance with these standards, institution of an effective system of verification and industry audit...

-The Economic Times The government plans to intervene in the use of water by industries and encourage conservation of the increasingly scarce resource by setting up a 'bureau of water-use efficiency' to grade various sectors and issue guidelines, official sources said.  "We'll start with the industries and analyse whether they are water friendly or not," said a senior official at the ministry of water resources.  For this, the ministry has roped in industrial...