-The Economist HOW should one judge the lot of women in India, a country that is in many ways progressive, modern, tolerant and yet by turns repressive and hostile? Women hold the highest political positions (the presidency, speaker of parliament, leader of the ruling party, leader of the opposition in parliament, several chief ministers of large states) and in theory they are protected by a variety laws promoting equality. Though development indicators...

-IANS The United States has asked the World Trade Organization (WTO) to rule on its assertion that India's restrictions on imports of US poultry meat and chicken eggs violates its WTO obligations. The US request to WTO to set up a dispute settlement panel was filed Monday after consultations with India on April 16-17, the first necessary step in pursuing a case, failed to resolve the US concerns, US Trade Representative (USTR)...

States to be urged to adopt resolutions for pension to elderly Following up its five-day dharna here, the Pension Parishad has decided to intensify political mobilisation for pressing its demand for universal old age pension. Several political leaders addressed the demonstrators during the dharna and the Parishad leaders called on President Pratibha Patil to elicit her support. On Saturday, a delegation will call on UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, who is also the chairperson...

-The Times of India As part of its mandatory obligation under the United Nations Convention against Corruption (UNCAC), the government has invited expression of interest (EoI) from registered Indian law institutions\firms, academic or research organizations to undertake the self-evaluation study. Selected agency will be required to complete its works - assessment of compliance of domestic laws\measures vis-a-vis requirements under UNCAC provisions - within 36 weeks. India had ratified the global convention to...

The government has taken exception to the `biases' in the United NationsDevelopment Programme's (UNDP) Asia Pacific Human Development report, titled, One Planet, which was released on Thursday. UNDP, required to play a neutral role in international governance, has recommended that India and other countries in the Asia Pacific region take greater responsibility to reduce emissions and warned that 'inclusive growth' would increase emissions, a trade-off that India cannot afford. Pointing...