It was quite a role reversal. Moments after my photoJournalist colleague Sayantoni and I introduced ourselves to the chief medical officer of Jhajjar district in Haryana, he did what we as Journalists normally do. Reel off a barrage of questions. The first question was new (not what one generally faces while covering renewable energy policy in Delhi), “Bhai-behen kitne hain? (How many sisters/brothers you have?)” and my quick answer was “koi...

The world’s population is projected to surge past 9 billion before 2050 and then reach 10.1 billion by the end of the century if current fertility rates continue at expected levels, according to United Nations figures unveiled today.   Most of the increase will come from so-called “high fertility countries,” mainly in sub-Saharan Africa but also in some nations in Asia, Oceania and Latin America, the figures reveal. The 2010 Revision of World...

Joint drafting panel on Lokpal Bill holds second meeting; public consultations after agreement on basic principles In the second round of discussions in the joint drafting committee on the Lokpal Bill here on Monday, members of civil society invoked the United Nations Convention on Corruption to stress that the underlying principle of the anti-corruption law should be to have an independent body that covers the highest executive and the judiciary. The...

A group of over 80 eminent personalities, including the former Atomic Energy Regulatory Board Chairman, A. Gopalakrishnan, has expressed shock at the Centre's announcement on the 25th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster in Russia that it would go ahead with the Jaitapur nuclear power plant. Terming it “sheer insensitivity” on the part of the government, the citizens' group said the decision meant disregarding the “overwhelming” opposition to the project by 40,000...

A senior Journalist, who was recently caught in the Radia tapes lobbying along with some other Journalists for some important persons vis-à-vis 2G spectrum controversy, admitted what they did was “utterly unprofessional.” The draft report of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), which went into the spectrum allocation deal, claimed under the heading “role of media and whistleblowers”: “When the committee sought the response of a senior Journalist about these taped conversations,...