-Live Mint   Data from the 2008 Karnataka polls and the 2009 Lok Sabha Elections reveal a small positive correlation Ever since the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) published its report on assets of candidates for the forthcoming assembly Elections in Karnataka, there has been significant outrage in the mainstream media about the significant increase in declared assets of candidates who had also contested in 2008. Given this background, we thought it might...

-The Hindu The Election Commission has disqualified 2,045 candidates who contested by-Elections/general Elections to the Lok Sabha and Legislative Assemblies of various States and Union Territories for failing to submit their poll expenditure accounts within the stipulated 30 days from the date of announcement of results. These persons, most of them non-serious contestants, will be barred from standing in any election conducted by the EC for three years from the date...

-Frontline   But in Modi's Gujarat the difference between development and darkness is all too visible to those who care to see. NARENDRA MODI may have won three consecutive Elections and ruled Gujarat for more than a decade after he was posted there almost as a night watchman, to borrow a cricketing expression. He may have mobilised a massive fan following that is shouting to catapult him into the Prime Minister's post,...

-Live Mint Why do the central and state govts deliberately undermine the constitutionally created panchayats? The collector of any district in India would be heading 100 to 150 committees related to various development initiatives in the area. Collectors often don't get time to prepare for or preside over the meetings of these committees-imagine what happens to implementation then. On the other hand, the heads of district panchayats and municipalities in the...

-The Hindu Kolkata: Emphasising the need for deploying Central paramilitary forces for conducting free and fair rural polls in the State, counsel for the State Election Commission told the Calcutta High Court here on Thursday that it was akin to handing over investigations of a sensitive case to the Central Bureau of Investigations (CBI) to ensure an "impartial" probe. At the hearing, counsel for the Commission Samaraditya Pal, cited various instances where...