-Reuters Cotton farmer Ravindra Krishna Patil in Maharashtra should be feeling flush after strong monsoon rains and a good crop, but high costs have cast a pall over his preparations for the festive season. Instead of splashing out on gold jewellery, appliances or maybe even a car during the biggest shopping season of the year, 28-year-old Patil must count his rupees after costs of everything from fuel to labour soared while cotton...

Shri Ram Sena activist held for brutal assault Senior lawyer and Team Anna member Prashant Bhushan was violently attacked by activists of the Shri Ram Sena and a previously unknown outfit, Bhagat Singh Kranti Sena, in his chamber located opposite the heavily guarded Supreme Court premises on Bhagwan Dass Road here on Wednesday. The organisations claimed that the assault was in retaliation for his recent statement on Jammu and Kashmir, purportedly...

-The Economic Times   The government on Tuesday said it would confer constitutional status on the proposed Lokpal , embracing the idea mooted by Rahul Gandhi.  "We are working on a very strong Lokpal bill. A Lokpal bill that will come with a constitutional amendment . That amendment will give the Lokpal the status of a constitutional authority," law minister Salman Khurshid told PTI on Tuesday.  Khurshid, who gave Rahul the credit for the...

India is finally ready with a comprehensive Bill that will protect children from sexual abuse. But the Bill, says author-activist Pinki Virani, has a major flaw regarding sexual consent that needs to be immediately addressed and the stakeholders consulted before it becomes law. With a certain Standing Committee so much in the news, let us look at what is happening with another Standing Committee looking into a Bill to protect children...

The Planning Commission’s poverty line affidavit has exposed how blissfully ignorant the glorified economists of the UPA are of the true reality of India The 2G spectrum scam, Commonwealth Games loot, cash-for-vote bribery, Lokpal fiasco, Pranab-Chidambaram duel on the Finance Ministry note, and the count goes on. It seems the UPA-II is stuck in a rut.  As if the battering by the united Opposition and hauling over the coals by civil...