Accused No 1 Noor-ul-Huda, 26 Labourer, Arrested on October 22, 2006 A month after the Malegaon blasts in September 2006, two policemen walked up to the house of Noor-ul-Huda at Jaffer Nagar on a Ramzan evening. They took Noor with them, telling his father they would send him back in 10 minutes. “Five years have passed. How long is their 10 minutes?” asks Noor’s father Shumshuz Zoha. This wasn’t the first time Noor...

As a humble cog in the vast and wondrous Machine of the Indian media, I want to extend my personal thanks to Justice Markandey Katju for his recent comments. He has been berated by the Editors Guild for his ‘tendentious and offensive’ remarks, but my own view is that we owe the new Chairman of the Press Council a small debt of gratitude. It is true that in his interview...

The word ‘hunger’ does not appear in the 12th Plan Approach Paper even once, whereas according to the latest Global Hunger Index Report, India continues to be in the category of those nations where hunger is ‘alarming’. What is worse, India is one of the three countries where the hunger index between 1996 and 2011 has gone up from 22.9 to 23.7, while 78 out of the 81 developing countries...

To control inflation and ensure long-term economic growth, India needs to harness the creativity of the large number of its farmers and entrepreneurs, especially in rural areas. The latest WPI inflation data show primary articles inflation in double digit, driven mainly by food inflation which remains stubbornly high at over 9 per cent. The high food prices are the result of structural factors with shortages getting aggravated as demand continues to outstrip...

-The Economist   A maverick minister lays into a hallowed programme IT LOOKS like risky politics for Jairam Ramesh, who runs India’s biggest civilian ministry, in charge of rural development, to lash out at his own government’s flagship welfare scheme. Mr Ramesh, who got his cabinet post in July, has sparked a row in the past week over corruption and poor results within a public programme that guarantees 100 days of paid work...