-The Hindu Paying women for domestic and care work is a recognition of their efforts but may not reduce and redistribute their burden Is the electoral promise of paying women for carrying out domestic work and care work a progressive public policy? The proposal, put forth by Kamal Haasan’s political party, Makkal Needhi Maiam, has generated curiosity and reopened the old but unsettled academic debate. On the face of it, the proposal...

-The Hindu This is an agenda all political parties, and not just the Makkal Needhi Maiam, could incorporate in their manifestos In the context of the forthcoming State Assembly election in Tamil Nadu, the Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM), led by veteran actor Kamal Haasan, has made an eye-catching election promise that is evidently targeted at a large constituency of voters — women who are full-time homemakers. The party has promised to recognise...

-Hindustan Times/ IANS/ PTI Protesters marching to close Vedanta’s Sterlite Copper plant tried to attack the district collector’s office in Tamil Nadu’s Tuticorin, say officials. New Delhi: Nine people died in a coastal city in southern Tamil Nadu on Tuesday when police fired at hundreds of protesters marching against a copper smelting plant tried to attack the district collector’s office, said officials. Protesters who blame the Vedanta group’s Sterlite plant for health problems...

-The Hindu Erode: While non-government and welfare organisations are understandably keen to enable tribal communities on the hills to derive utility of abundance of bamboo on the hilly parts, there are indications of ambiguity over the status of implementation of Forest Rights Act 2006 under which bamboo is considered a minor forest produce. The Union Ministry of Environment and Forests had, during 2011, asked states to treat bamboo as a minor forest...

-The Hindu The sense of impunity that drives discrimination against Dalits is at the heart of recent demands for the dilution, or even repeal, of the Act for prevention of atrocities against SCs and STs It is the sense of impunity nurtured by caste hierarchy that prepares the social ground for the “shockingly cruel and inhumane” crimes against Dalits called atrocities. It is this impunity that the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled...