The Jaipur Literary Festival, a giddily chaotic celebration of the written word set on the grounds of a Rajasthan palace, ended in misery and embarrassment today, with the organizers bowing to pressure from local security forces and scotching plans for Salman Rushdie to “appear” at the festival, finally, by video link. Rushdie had already been forced to cancel plans to come to Jaipur after he had received intelligence reports—bogus intelligence,...

-The Economic Times   The Supreme Court has refused to stay a recent Karnataka High Court verdict that has said the central government is liable to pay higher wages under the country's flagship rural employment programme in tandem with that of the state minimum wage rate. It has further asked the government to find a way to end the disparity between the wages paid under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Act (MGNREGA)...

-The Hindu   For 11 Muslim youths exonerated in connection with 2008 Jaipur serial blasts; denied bail, they spent three years in prison   More than a month after a fast track court here acquitted 11 persons of the charge of involvement in the May 2008 Jaipur serial blasts, the Congress-led government in Rajasthan is yet to respond to demands for compensation to the exonerated youths on the Andhra Pradesh pattern and action against...

Third report in three months to highlight lack of quality education in India; poses risk to knowledge hub hopes Nearly two years after the Right to Education (RTE) Act was introduced with the promise of providing free and compulsory education to all primary school children, the learning outcome in the country has actually deteriorated in terms of quality. In yet another wake-up call for policymakers, the 2011 Annual Status of Education Report...

-The Telegraph   The quality of elementary education is falling in rural schools almost two years after education was made a fundamental right in April 2010. The Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2011, a survey of government and private schools in rural areas conducted by the NGO Pratham, shows a decline in schoolchildren’s “learning outcome levels” compared with the previous year, whether in reading or arithmetic skills.  However, students of private schools have...