-Hindustan Times The social justice and empowerment ministry has decided to go ahead with a bill which seeks to provide recognition to transgenders and protect their Rights despite other ministries “failing” to send their comments on it during the inter-ministerial consultation process. It has sent the draft bill on the ‘Rights of Transgender Persons Bill, 2016’ to the law ministry for finalisation before it is sent to the cabinet for approval. “The draft...

-The Times of India Gandhinagar: The delayed implementation of the National Food Security Act (NFSA) by the Gujarat government from April 1 has thrown up a rather unappetizing truth. More than 1.58 lakh people with permanent government jobs, four wheelers, five or more acres of land, monthly income of Rs 10,000 and paying income-tax -- were feeding off wheat and rice at Rs 2 per kg and highly subsidized sugar and kerosene...

-The Hindu Business Line Katha Nilayam, with its 88,000-strong collection, is the first stop for any queries on Telugu short stories Just before we begin our conversation, the 92-year-old Kalipatnam Rama Rao gets a call from a research scholar in Warangal. The caller wants to know whether a particular story written by Tadi Nagamma in the 1930s is stocked in Rao’s library. “I will have it checked,” Rao assures him, and immediately...

-Economic and Political Weekly The Maharashtra government's village forest rules seek to overturn the Rights regime established in the letter of the law by the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act and the Panchayats (Extension to the Scheduled Areas) Act 1996 in terms of both community Rights, as well as the Rights over minor forest produce. Moreover, the rules write away the future Rights of...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: An NGO has questioned a move to have national security adviser Ajit Doval address a conclave of Supreme Court judges today without a counterbalancing presence of human Rights activists to present an alternative view. In a letter to Chief Justice of India T.S. Thakur, the Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms has argued that the three-day judges' retreat in Bhopal that ends tomorrow should also invite Rights activists...