-The Economist MID-AFTERNOON in Delhi, and a red blob looms in the haze. The sun barely illuminates the city. A yellow-green smog hangs low. Even indoors, fuzzy halos of dust and smoke surround lamps. Those foolish enough to be out jogging, or compelled to stand at junctions directing traffic, complain of shortness of breath, migraines, clogged lungs. Newspapers are crammed with articles about asthma, wheezing children at clinics, an epidemic of...

-The Times of India The government would soon announce the appointment of the first National Cyber Security Coordinator (NCSC), stepping up its effort to put up a coordinated response to the various challenges in cyber space. Sources said Gulshan Rai, who presently heads the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-IN), would be named the first NCSC. The coordinator's task would primarily be to coordinate among various agencies involved in cyber security. Rai...

-The Times of India Chief Information Commissioner Satyananda Mishra on Saturday lamented that public authorities have failed to make crucial pro-active disclosures despite seven years of the implementation of the RTI Act. Referring to section four of the RTI Act which mandates public authorities to make proactive disclosures and organize records within 120 days of enactment of transparency law in 2005, Mishra said these statutory provisions haven't been complied with even...

-Down to Earth Rice cultivation has led to waterlogging and soil salinity in Haryana’s Jhajjar district CASTE-BASED khap panchayats of Haryana are usually in the news for passing regressive and, often, controversial orders in the name of honouring social customs. But this year in January, the Jhakkar khap panchayat of Jhajjar district gave a rather unusual order in the larger interest of the farming community. It ordered that all the 36...

-The Times of India LUCKNOW: In a development that further establishes the poor state of the Ganga, an inter-ministerial group (IMG) at the Centre is all set to classify the holy river in the 'C' (poor) category. The categorization is likely to be done in view of a report submitted by IIT-Roorkee which found that in the coming days 84% of the water flow in the river will either be diverted...