India continues to be one of the most corrupt nations in the world with many of its Public Institutions given to rampant misdeeds. Corruption is India's bane and threatens to derail its rapidly growing economy. The country ranks a dismal 84th in a list of 180 countries, according to Transparency International's 2009 Corruption Perceptions Index, a measure of domestic and public sector corruption. The corruption watchdog says that many African,...

HAS GREEN REVOLUTION FAILED INDIA'S POOR? Green Revolution Vs Rain-fed Farming OVERVIEW: Of late India’s fabled Green Revolution has come under severe attack. Many development thinkers believe that it has unfairly skewed India’s agriculture policy in favour of the farmers whose land is already or potentially covered under irrigation. The basic criticism is that the Green Revolution has been largely irrelevant for India’s 60 per cent cultivable land which is un-irrigated. These...

India should insist that developed nations take the lead with substantial emission reductions, in line with the IPCC recommendations. Any non-binding agreement committing all nations without distinction should be rejected.  It is a measure of the current state of global climate negotiations that the only point on which all nations are likely to agree is that the prospects of an agreement at Copenhagen are far from bright. The moral and...

The recently enacted Right to Education Act, 2009 has extensively been debated in the media, civil society and academic palaver. Mainstream also intervened in the debate, and to the best of my recollection, published two pieces: first, a rather elaborate one by Muchkund Dubey on September 19, 2009, and thereafter by N.A. Karim on October 3, 2009. While entirely endorsing the views expressed in these two articles and sharing the...

This newspaper recently hosted its annual debate on whether a resurgent Bengal was an impossible dream. Not surprisingly, the verdict of the 600-odd listeners went against the motion. This has as much to do with tangible societal gains as with an enveloping sense of crisis which embeds enormous opportunities. The glorious past of Bengal needs no persuasion. It was integrated with the rest of the world through trade and interchange...