In a spate of recent cases in Punjab, information seekers are being turned away by public institutions on the ground that they are not covered under the RTI Act, and are not obLIGed to share information about their functioning. This despite the fact that almost all these institutions have received financial aid from the state government.   In nearly all such cases, the information seekers had to knock the doors of Information...

In India's western state of Maharashtra, a project supported by Japan International Cooperation Agency is yielding better incomes for farmers and has lured the migrants back to their native villages. PROJECT: RURAL DEVELOPMENT FOR POVERTY REDUCTION PERIOD: 2008-2011 Vishwanath Gangaram Malpote, 28, is in the midst of a robust harvest. As he weeds his rice field, one cannot but help admire his meticulous effort to pluck off the small undergrowth from the standing...

-DNA Though senior Congress leaders were not present in the assembly, the spirit of Congress MLAs was high and it was evident from the walkout which they staged on Wednesday. They were demanding an apology from state tribal development minister Mangu Patel for his alleged derogatory comments on tribals of the state. The discussion on non-governmental resolution by members of the assembly was scheduled for Wednesday. Congress MLA from Pavi Jetpur and chairman...

Funding agency for rural NGOs may be on its last legs IT IS a government agency that was set up specially to fund non-profits working on rural development. But of late the Council for People’s Action and Advancement of Rural Technology (CAPART) has been plagued by allegations of corruption and inefficiency. After a few failed attempts to reform CAPART, the government has now decided to overhaul the agency which has close...

-The Economist   A year after Fukushima, the future for nuclear power is not bright—for reasons of cost as much as safety THE enormous power tucked away in the atomic nucleus, the chemist Frederick Soddy rhapsodised in 1908, could “transform a desert continent, thaw the frozen poles, and make the whole world one smiling Garden of Eden.” Militarily, that power has threatened the opposite, with its ability to make deserts out of gardens...