Can more knowledge about our society, about the individuals and groups who constitute it, be a bad thing? I’ve been wondering about this lately, in the context of two government initiatives to gather more knowledge about us Indians, as caste groups and as individuals. Both of these information-gathering exercises—the proposal for a “caste census”, which has generated a stormy argument, and the merely desultory discussion over the planned Unique Identification...
More »SEARCH RESULT
Total Matching Records found : 1228
Activists dig out climate policy gaps with India's Right to Information Act by Teresa Rehman
Climate activists in India have discovered a crucial tool in their battle to hold the government accountable on its climate policies: the country's landmark Right to Information (RTI) Act. Passed in 2005, the act requires all government bodies to respond to citizen requests for information within 30 days. Many bodies, threatened with legal action after initially failing to respond, are now delivering information that shows big gaps in the country's...
More »The social question, who cares? by Jan Breman
Built into the economic dogma of growth first is the ingrained notion held by large segments of the nation's elite that the fabric of inequality is meant to remain unimpaired. “The Challenge of Employment in India; An Informal Economy Perspective” sums up the findings of a National Commission set up in September 2004 to review the status of the unorganised/ínformal sector in India (Volume I Main Report and volume II...
More »Whistleblowers at receiving end after using RTI by Meena Menon
Two events triggered widespread condemnation and protests Satish Shetty, who was murdered, had targeted the land mafia Dattatray Patil's targets were the powers that be in Kolhapur While Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan is proud that the State has an impressive 98.69 per cent disposal rate of requests under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, the murder of two campaigners who used the law to good effect is a blot. First, it was...
More »Whistleblowers at receiving end after using RTI by Meena Menon
While Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan is proud that the State has an impressive 98.69 per cent disposal rate of requests under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, the murder of two campaigners who used the law to good effect is a blot. First, it was Satish Shetty at Talegaon, near Pune, who was killed on January 13, and more recently Dattatray Patil at Ichalkaranji, in Kolhapur district, on May 22....
More »
