-TCN News   Forum for Student Democracy Convener and RTI Activist Afroz Alam Sahil on Friday was called by the administration of Jamia Millia Islamia for clarification of his stand on his own statement that he made two weeks ago on NDTV regarding alleged swindling of some funds by the varsity. Jamia had taken strong notice of his statement and sent him a legal notice worth Rs 50 lakh. In today’s meeting with...

Questionable drug trials on mentally challenged persons by doctors in Indore emphasise the need for strict enforcement of medical ethics. IN what appears to be a page out of Robin Cook's medical thriller, government and private doctors in Indore, Madhya Pradesh, reportedly carried out clinical trials of various medicines on some 233 patients who had gone to them seeking psychiatric treatment. As in Cook's famous book Coma, in which a medical...

-BBC   Indian media have criticised the government for failing to ensure the security of author Salman Rushdie after threats of violence prevented him from addressing an Indian literary festival. Rushdie cancelled a video-link call to the festival after Muslim groups threatened to disrupt proceedings. The author blamed politicians for failing to oppose the groups for "narrow political reasons". Many Muslims regard his book, The Satanic Verses, as blasphemous. It was banned in India in 1988...

-The Indian Express   The last time he was at the Jaipur Literature Festival, Salman Rushdie was barely noticed. He spent three days in the city in 2007, and faced no protests. Some of the protesters this time agree that few had known about that visit. The opposition began with the Darul Uloom Deoband in UP before being taken up in Rajasthan, where the protests were spearheaded by Amin Pathan, chairperson for the...

-Economic and Political Weekly   The Reliance/Network18 deal should make us wake up to the impending threat to media plurality. Few are discussing it. India has just seen one of the biggest media deals, where the country’s leading industrial and business giant has bought into the largest network of news and current affairs TV channels. Yet, the fact that this could mark the beginning of a trend leading to private media being controlled...