-The Hindu The Left parties have always maintained that the financial statements and accounts of a political party should be made publicly available, and hence strongly rejected the order of the Central Information Commission (CIC) that sought to bring six national parties under the purview of the Right to Information Act, 2005. Disputing the CIC's argument that parties were public authorities, Prakash Karat, general secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist),...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday said intercepted phone conversations of former corporate lobbyist Niira Radia indicated her alleged influence in every field of decision-making and wondered why investigating agencies, despite being aware of the Radia tape contents, did not take action for four years. "We are unable to appreciate one thing. Virtually in every field, which should be with the government, a private person, call her...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: "Can citizens expect fair governance," asked the Supreme Court on Tuesday, exasperated by the repeated reference to alleged involvement of middlemen in the Radia tapes, a cache of intercepted phone conversations of former corporate lobbyist Niira Radia with businessmen, politicians, journalists and bureaucrats. After going through the court-appointed team's analysis of transcripts of all 5,831 telephone intercepts, the CBI's 2G scam probe team through senior advocate...

-The Economic Times If India is now debating opening the books and operations of political parties to the public, it's because of these six people who pulled strategic levers and applied relentless pressure. Soma Banerjee traces a four-year effort that converted intent to action Balwant Singh Khera, a politician from Hoshiarpur in Punjab, is not a name that will strike a chord in mainstream politics or social discourse today. It might in...

-Stanford Social Innovation Review Looked at from the perspective of the political right, and the left, and the center, the proposed law making CSR mandatory is a really bad idea. Companies all over the world are under increasing pressure to demonstrate that they are responsible citizens, with about 70 percent of large companies in Europe and the Americas reporting on their corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives. Despite this, the very concept...