-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Delhi HC order empowering CAG to audit private telecom companies would not only kick off a massive audit exercise,but also ensure that CAG is empowered to audit PPPs (public-private partnerships), and similar engagements where private sector is engaged in some of the traditional government functions. "It is a landmark judgment, it will be quoted and discussed for years to come," a senior audit official said,...

-The Indian Express Overriding the government's authority to grant environmental clearances, the Supreme Court on Monday ordered the setting up of a national regulator with offices across the country to appraise projects, enforce environmental norms for approvals and penalise polluters. The Green bench led by Justice A K Patnaik rejected the government's contention that it alone was the regulator under the Forest (Conservation) Act and that no one else could be appointed...

-The Indian Express     Policy design should worry less about public versus private, and more about choice and accountability. The most noteworthy aspect of the Aam Aadmi Party's manifesto is the explicit focus on service delivery. This is what its government will be evaluated on, and attention has shifted from the AAP's political success to how it will deliver on these promises. The ideas below reflect learnings from over a decade of research...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: A year after the Supreme Court pulled up 19 states, including Bengal, that did not have a commission to protect children's rights and directed them to set up one, most of these panels exist only on paper. All states/Union territories are required to have a child rights commission under Section 17 of the Commission for Protection of Child Rights Act, 2005. Twenty-three states now have the panels -...

-Newsclick.in With sixty percent children malnourished in the state, the implementation of the Integrated Child Development Services, the largest scheme to provide nutrition to children in the country, is nothing but a sham. Sitting outside her semi-pucca house in Bilgram block, Kasturi says, "My children get five fistful of panjiri once a month from the Aanganwadi Centre." Thirty-three year-old Kasturi has never, in her parents' village or her in-law's village seen an...