-The Economic Times   The enacting of the Lokpal Bill has been deferred in the Rajya Sabha but that need not end the discussion on how focused the proposals are when it comes to tackling corruption. For instance, what exactly are the quotas in the Lokpal meant to do? If out of an eight-or-nine-member Lokpal, four or five should be from SCs, STs, OBCs, minorities and women, what is the message going...

The lone Indian activist on the 2011 TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world, Aruna Roy has been more successful than most,  when it comes to getting the government’s attention. The Chennai-born former bureaucrat who was an instrumental force behind the revolutionary Right to Information Act has also been credited by the government for “incorporating strong citizen entitlements” in the ambitious National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). A constant...

If you are a resident of Madhya Pradesh, Muslim and poor, nowhere close to the class of nawabs who can pay for murg musallam or mutton raan, watch your pot! The BJP government, led by Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, has just armed itself with a big danda ostensibly to protect the holy cow and its progeny. But, make no mistake, it’s a stick to beat you with. To save your...

-ANI Humanity, harmony, good governance are ideals a democratic nation aspires to. As the world's largest Democracy, India is no exception. Her lawmakers and administrators, often the brightest of her citizens, vow to serve the people and govern them with integrity. These lofty ideals, hever, hold no ground in the face of the harsh pressures of conflict, now spreading rapidly across the country. I searched for and interviewed every single individual of a...

-The Telegraph   Dispur this evening formally invited the anti-dam groups for talks on January 5 while issuing a separate public appeal asking them to withdraw their blockade of supplies to the Lower Subansiri hydel project, in a bid to end the standoff that began on December 16. CMO sources said home secretary G.D. Tripathi this evening issued the formal letters to Lakhimpur-based groups through the district administration and to the Guwahati-based organisations...