-The Hindu     While denying voting rights to undertrials contradicts the principle that a person is innocent until proved guilty, disenfranchising convicts will aggravate their alienation from society The Supreme Court's decision last month in Chief Election Commissioner v. Jan Chaukidar has attracted significant attention for its perceived potential to address the criminalisation of politics. Justices A.K Patnaik and S.J. Mukhopadhaya ruled that since one of the conditions to be a candidate under...

-The Hindu     Bench orders Rs. 10 lakh each for two girls, who were gang-raped in February last at Betma in Indore The Supreme Court on Monday directed the Madhya Pradesh government to pay as compensation Rs.10 lakh each to two girls, who were gang-raped in February last year at Betma in Indore district. A Bench of Justices R.M. Lodha and Madan B. Lokur passed the order on an appeal filed by the 84-year-old...

-The Hindu Per capita entitlements under the food security bill will not cover beneficiaries as comprehensively as household entitlements The government hopes to secure in this session of Parliament, approval for the National Food Security Bill (NFSB) so that it can replace the food security ordinance. The NFSB, on which the ordinance is based, guarantees supplementary nutrition services through anganwadis for all children under six, midday meals for schoolchildren, and, very importantly, maternity...

-PTI Chennai: Flaying the Centre for "unilaterally" and "hastily" promulgating the National Food Security Ordinance 2013, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa on Saturday urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to replace the ordinance with a Bill which addresses the state's concerns. "The union Government has unilaterally and hastily promulgated the National Food Security Ordinance, 2013. Though the Ordinance claims to provide food security to all, unfortunately, contrary to such a claim, there...

-IndiaResists.com The ongoing debate between two stalwart economists, Amartya Sen and Jagdish Bhagwati, must be joined by those who understand contemporary realities and challenges in terms altogether different from those of mainstream economists. In a recent (July 27) article in Times of India, Bhagwati's co-author Arvind Panagariya characterizes the differences between the two in the following terms. Sen favours education and health measures as being the first steps to tackle poverty...