In a recent lecture, delivered in Mumbai in memory of Nani Palkhivala, the home minister, P. Chidambaram, attacked “left-leaning intellectuals” and “human rights groups”, who, in his view, “plead the naxalite cause ignoring the violence unleashed by the naxalites on innocent men, women and children”. “Why are the human rights groups silent?” asked the home minister. The short answer is that they aren’t, and haven’t been, silent. There are very...

How green are our cities? The key number in measuring that now is the per capita emission or how big a carbon footprint an individual leaves. The developed world pegs lndia's per capita emission at 1.7 tonnes. But a study by a non-profit organization of 40 Indian cities says it is much lower at less than 1 tonne. The worst big city in India is Kolkata, at 1.83 tonnes, but it is...

In a dramatic turn in the Ambani brothers' gas dispute case, Justice R V Raveendran, a senior Supreme Court judge on Wednesday withdrew from the Bench hearing it saying his daughter is associated with a solicitors firm advising Mukesh Ambani group on other global projects. A new Bench will be constituted tomorrow to hear the high-voltage case between Mukesh Amabani's RIL and Anil Ambani's RNRL relating to pricing of gas...

BARSUR, India — At the edge of the Indravati River, hundreds of miles from the nearest international border, India effectively ends. Indian paramilitary officers point machine guns across the water. The dense jungles and mountains on the other side belong to Maoist rebels dedicated to overthrowing the government. “That is their liberated zone,” said P. Bhojak, one of the officers stationed at the river’s edge in this town in the...

It’s not hard to find tender hands of children as young as five washing utensils at roadside dhabas or girls below 14 working as domestic helps in India’s IT hub Bangalore. A new e—journal is being started in another effort to fight the menace. The State Resource Centre (SRC) on Child Labour is all set to start the bi-monthly journal within the next three months. “The idea behind the e-journal...