When Sujatha’s husband learned that she had conceived just five months after they got married, he became agitated over what he called her "ill-timed pregnancy". To worsen her husband’s anxiety, a test to determine the sex of the foetus showed she was carrying a girl. Sujatha, a public school teacher, and her husband, a civil engineer – who asked that their full names be withheld – are from well-off and educated...

The Supreme Court order against the Salwa Judum’s vigilantism in Chhattisgarh must be read by all, especially government officials. The details of the civil war in the tribal districts of Chhattisgarh are largely unknown to most readers of this newspaper. For the region is remote and inaccessible, and easily ignored by the national media.   This civil war pits, on the one side, Maoist extremists, and, on the other, a band of...

-PTI   Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi, who will complete the last stretch of his padyatra today, has said that he has learnt more from the farmers than the time he has spent as a Member of Parliament in the Lok Sabha. Interacting with farmers at Devaka village, Gandhi said: "When we sit in Delhi or Lucknow, we don't get to know ground realities. I have not learnt as much in Lok Sabha...

-The Telegraph   The Mamata Banerjee government has kickstarted a process to hold talks with Maoists without mentioning conditions but acknowledged the responsibilities of governance by adding that central forces will remain until Jungle Mahal is cleansed of arms. The initiative also sought to address a fundamental issue often overlooked by the security and political establishments: the chief minister gave an assurance that the villagers will retain the right to forest resources so...

If actions speak louder than words, then the government has just spoken loud and clear. There could be no stronger indication of the government’s lack of serious intent in building an effective anti-corruption regime than the decision to remove the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) from the purview of the Right to Information (RTI) law. Without any discussion in the public domain, the government has decided to use Section 24 of...