The NREGS is restricted. The PDS is targeted. Only exploitation is universal. The rotting of lakhs of tonnes of foodgrain in open yards, while shocking, is hardly new or surprising. Remember the rural poor marching on godowns in Andhra Pradesh in 2001 in similar circumstances? The Supreme Court was quite right in jolting the Union government. “In a country where admittedly people are starving, it is a crime to waste even...

When flames from an open cooking fire raced through Fida Hussein's shack in northern India, it was a disaster for him and his poverty-stricken family. "We have nothing," said Hussein as he stood in the ruins of his hut through which the sky could be seen between the burnt roof timbers in a remote corner of Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state. India's number of millionaires grew by 51 percent...

Hours before the Group of Ministers (GoM) headed by Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram met on Friday, the Planning Commission is understood to have released Rs.982 crore to the Madhya Pradesh government for rehabilitation of the Bhopal gas tragedy victims. There was no official word on the reported approval of funds. The funds released for sustainable economic and medical rehabilitation of the victims would need the approval of the GoM, official...

In India peasantry is under assault. There is a five-pronged attack on this class and the mighty Indian state is sometimes an active and sometimes a passive abettor. The first point of attack is from the corporate sector. The corporate sector is in a land grab mode. Though not justified, one could understand their urge to get land for industry and real estate purposes. Not that they are causing aggressive...

So, Shashi Tharoor has gone. Lalit Modi may follow. Or not.   Cricket’s great jamboree may be cleaned up. Or not.   Does it matter so much?   The Indian Premier League (IPL) brouhaha could not have come at a worse time. India was, finally, if reluctantly, starting to focus on long-festering-but-urgent issues that prevent this country from being a just, equitable democracy. As Tharoor and Modi self-destructed, the circus around them diverted all...