One week from now, the United Nations estimates, the world’s population will reach seven billion. Because censuses are infrequent and incomplete, no one knows the precise date—the US Census Bureau puts it somewhere next March—but there can be no doubt that humanity is approaching a milestone. The first billion people accumulated over a leisurely interval, from the origins of humans hundreds of thousands of years ago to the early 1800s. Adding...

In the winter of 2009, a few months after the Congress announced a financial austerity drive for its staff, Sonia Gandhi famously travelled by economy class. But what UPA government's ministers probably saved on air fares, they seem to have more than made up on land. Fuel bills of Union ministers, since the financial curbs were put in place, were accessed by RTI activist Chetan Kothari. Merely 31 of the 84...

Although India is a labour-surplus economy – with an unlimited number of workers willing to work at a subsistence wage – a paradoxical feature of the labour market is the rising incidence of scarcity or shortages amid a situation of potential plenty. No doubt, this pertains to skilled labour. But when 15 per cent of Indian trucks are idle owing to a shortage of drivers or India Inc is worried...

Vilas Bhagwan Pote grins as he recalls his election as sarpanch of Ralegan Siddhi, Anna Hazare’s village in Ahmednagar district, 11 years ago. “I was the traitor, the bad guy,” he jokes. “I openly defied Anna because I felt he was wrong.” Pote, a Dalit charmakar (cobbler) then in his 30s, had been unhappy as the 2000 panchayat polls drew close. As always, Anna had nominated a new executive body for the...

-The Financial Express   Agriculture minister Sharad Pawar on Wednesday said the proposed food security Act should target only needy sections of society for nutritional cover, citing an adverse impact on economy in case its ambit is widened — a stance contrary to the draft bill approved by the empowered group of ministers (EGoM) in July. The draft bill provides for the supply of subsidised coarse cereals for nutrional food security to the...