This article documents and then examines the various benefits that, it is claimed, will flow from linking the Unique Identity number with the public distribution system and the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme. It filters the unfounded claims, which arise from a poor understanding of how the PDS and NREGS function, from the genuine ones. On the latter, there are several demanding conditions that need to be met in order...

The attorney-general of India today urged the Supreme Court to permit Aruna Shanbaug, a Mumbai nurse who has been in a coma for over 38 years, to live in her present state and not stop food to end her life. Shanbaug, 60, has been in a persistent vegetative state since a murderous attack by a ward attendant of Mumbai’s KEM hospital who tied a dog chain around her neck and tried...

The Union Cabinet on Thursday cleared a Bill seeking to prevent sexual abuse of children, with provisions for stringent punishment for such offences. The proposed legislation aims at protecting children against offences of sexual assault, sexual harassment, pornography and provides for establishment of special courts for trial of such offences. Section 7 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Bill, 2011, does not provide for any punishment if the consent for...

The promise of the FRA remains largely unfulfilled, says a committee set up by the Ministries of Environment and Forests and Tribal Affairs. IT seems hard for a government used to controlling most of India's common lands to let go of them. Even though it has passed a law mandating more decentralised governance of forests, the government itself is proving to be the biggest obstacle in its implementation. Other than in...

The Bhopal Memorial Hospital and Research Centre (BMHRC) has pocketed over Rs 1 crore by allowing pharma companies to conduct clinical trials of drugs on its patients — victims of the gas disaster of 1984. Shockingly, out of the 7 trials carried out in the hospital since 2004, only one was inspected or monitored by the government watchdog Drug Controller General of India (DCGI). This was revealed in response to...