It's simple and doable, but it is deliberately being avoided: N. Ram N. Ram, Editor-in-Chief of The Hindu, on Tuesday emphasised the need for an internal news ombudsman in the press and the news channels in the country. He was delivering a lecture on ‘Media ethics and police-media relations' organised here by the Mumbai police. “Unfortunately, no one else has taken this up [except The Hindu which has a readers' editor] because...

Indian civil society was dismayed and horror-struck when human rights activist Dr Binayak Sen, who has spent over three decades caring for the poor in tribal areas of central India, was sentenced to life imprisonment for ‘sedition’ along with two others, Piyush Guha and Narayan Sanyal by a Raipur Sessions Court judge.  Protests are taking place everywhere in the country and the members of India’s vibrant civil society, peoples’ movements,...

Mandated to monitor the implementation of the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights is planning social monitoring of the historic law that guarantees elementary education to children in the age group of 6-14. This is the first time that the law separates the implementing agency from the monitoring one. The basic premise of social monitoring is public participation in...

A day after Goa governor S S Sidhu was summoned by the State Information Commission (SIC) for denying information under the Right To Information (RTI) Act, social activist Aires Rodrigues filed a caveat in the high court of Bombay at Goa anticipating that the governor may move the HC against the SIC notice. In his caveat before the high court, Rodrigues has prayed that no order be passed without notice...

The Karnataka Information Commission (KIC) is rolling out tech-based services for quick information at hand. From the first week of January, this apex body of the Right to Information (RTI) in Karnataka will launch an SMS facility for RTI applicants. "The trial will begin this Friday. The facility will help applicants know the number of their case, when it'll be posted for hearing and also about its disposal. This information will...