A new report from Right to Sanitation Campaign in India entitled: In Deep Shit paints a gloomy picture about the position of India's sanitation, and simultaneously draws our attention to the case of ‘missing' and ‘dead' toilets. The report has questioned the claims made by the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation (MDWS) that India is making great strides in availing toilets to its rural population through the Nirmal Bharat...

-The Hindu India's long-standing legacies of caste, gender and class antagonism replicate on campuses as well. As higher education moves forward, it does so on these social cleavages The brutal sexual attack on a young woman in Delhi, in 2012, and a savage attack on a girl student of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) on its campus this year are just two examples of extreme violence that have shocked the nation. Acts of...

-The Business Standard Intrastate inequality can only be corrected through reform of budgetary allocation formulae between districts within states The hoopla surrounding election results in India is reminiscent of nothing so much as a horse race ("...and X romps home the winner!"). The difference is that for the horse and its handlers, the work is done when the race is over. For the winners in the recent round of state elections,...

-The Hindustan Times On 16 December, D, 25, a Kolkata resident, was returning home, from the fashion boutique he owns, when some people on the street threw eggs at him. A day or two earlier, a group of approximately seven men from the neighbourhood had blocked his way, demanding to know how much they would have to pay him in return for sexual favours. He was also groped on the street....

-The Hindu There is no disparagement of subsidies in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh because those who attack the social welfare policies of the Congress regard them as examples of good governance by a party of the Right Three propositions dominate explanations of the Congress party's rout, the Bharatiya Janata Party's impressive victory and the Aam Aadmi Party's stunning success in Delhi in the recent Assembly elections. One, that there is a strong...