-The Hindu Corruption in India has undergone a qualitative shift from the days of licence Raj to the era of liberalisation. Opportunities for making money have come in handy for politicians, who were also dealing with a new political situation of fragmentation and instability. In the days leading to the 2008 Assembly election in Karnataka, slum-dwellers in Bangalore were startled to see small bundles flying in through their windows at night. The...
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Has PM Modi bowed to US pressure on patent laws? -Rema Nagarajan
-The Times of India A paragraph buried in the US-India joint statement, which talks of establishing an annual high-level Intellectual Property (IP) working group as part of the Trade Policy Forum, has made health activists across the world apprehensive that the Modi government might be bending to US pressure to change its patent laws. Several health policy experts and activists have issued statements urging India not to give in to US...
More »Groundwater reserves dwindle to critical level amid rampant extraction -Akash Vashishtha
-India Today Groundwater is being extracted in Delhi, Haryana, Punjab and Rajasthan at a rate faster than it's replenished, according to the latest report of the Central Ground Water Board (CGWB). The status of groundwater extraction - the proportion of water drawn out to annual recharge - in Delhi and the three states is more than 100 per cent. In Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Lakshwadeep, Pondicherry and Daman and Diu, the...
More »New buildings keep guzzling, small steps at home giant leap for energy saving -Amitabh Sinha
-The Indian Express All the extra money that you spent on installing CFL lights in your homes, in buying new LED television sets, and on five-star rated air-conditioners and refrigerators instead of three-star ones, have proved to be worthwhile, having resulted in huge energy savings for India in the last decade. Between 2000 and 2011, a total of 791 million tonnes of oil equivalent energy was saved, thanks to measures like...
More »New drug era -Shamnad Basheer
-The Indian Express Prime Minister Narendra Modi's US visit is likely to throw up highly contentious intellectual property rights issues. Indeed, for the last several years, US drug majors and their European counterparts have lobbied hard to demonise the Indian patent regime. But the government must continue to defend the law and stand its ground. Particularly since our own industrial moguls have caved in and are less vocal about their opposition...
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