-Live Mint Despite being declared unconstitutional by SC, ‘khaps' continue to hold sway in parallel with the state machinery Rohtak/Bhiwani: Ravinder Gehlawat and his wife Shilpa had been married for less than four months when they were marched out of their village-Dharana in Jhajjar district of Haryana-by men of the local community and warned never to return. Their fate was sealed on 24 April 2009 when the local khap panchayat, which translates...

-The Hindu     Lakshmi Puri calls for greater political momentum on Women's Reservation Bill "My ambition for my country is it should become a democracy for women, by women and of women. This revolution is happening at the local level but [it] should also happen at the State and national level," said Lakshmi Puri, Assistant Secretary-General of the United Nations and acting head of U.N. Women. She believes much progress has been made by...

-The Hindu Natpurwa is a village where women have been forced into prostitution for centuries. And one of them is determined to help the others break free. Round faced, stout and dusky, Chandralekha, at age 15, was the most desired girl among the politicians, policemen and senior members of Eastern Uttar Pradesh’s civil society. “They always wanted plump women,” says Chandralekha, now 51 years old. Chandralekha was pushed into prostitution, by her...

-The Times of India The free trade agreement that European Union is pushing India to sign could put an end to India's status as the pharmacy of the developing providing affordable medicines, especially HIV drugs to countries like Brazil, Thailand, South Africa, Zimbabwe and several others. The negotiations with EU are on at a feverish pace this week in Brussels even before the parliamentary standing committee looking into the free trade...

-The Hindu Since 2005-06, taxes and duties for the corporate world and the rich have been written off at the rate of Rs.7 million a minute on average. Duties waived on gold and diamonds in the last 36 months equal the 2G scam amount Forbes has just added an “errata” to Union Finance Minister P. Chidambaram’s budget speech. The Minister had found a mere 42,800 people in the country with a taxable...