“They are trying to intimidate me, my family and my well-wishers” A Vadodara-based social activist and environmentalist, Rohit Prajapati, has complained of “harassment and intimidation” by the police for making RTI queries regarding the State government's environment policies. He claimed that the police and the Special Operations Group were “questioning” him, asking for photographs and making other inquiries in the past couple of years. While the police claimed these to be “routine...

The finance ministry may have amended the Prevention of Money Laundering Rules, 2005, to notify Aadhaar as adequate to meet KYC norms for opening bank accounts, putting it alongside other identity proofs, but banks are still confused Is a unique ID number or Aadhaar number issued by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) enough to satisfy the so-called know-your-customer (KYC) norms that banks have to ensure every account they open...

-The Times of India   Chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) Nandan Nilekani has said that the unique identity programme or 'Aadhaar' should not be viewed as "a technologically complicated and purposeless activity". "The programme has much wider and scalable applications for ensuring effective and efficient delivery of public distribution system (PDS) and welfare services," he said while delivering the inaugural speech at the launch of the Pune International Centre...

There are structural aspects to a problem as complex as corruption. These cannot be tackled through punishment alone. Just as our society tends to latch on to holy men for miracle cures, in recent weeks, the urban middle classes have placed great hopes on an anti-corruption movement led by a pious man in a Gandhi cap. (The other claim on leadership by a holy man in red robes did not...

-The Indian Express   Seven farmers on Wednesday sat on a hunger strike in Dharamheri village to protest the construction of Hansi-Butana toe wall and to demand measures to check floods in the area. BKU (Ekta Dakaounda) Patiala district president Darshan Pal said that chain hunger strike would be observed till September 16 where alternate group of farmers would observe the strike daily. He added that if their demands were not met,...