-Deccan Herald Frustrated over his ‘failure’ to ensure development of Dalits and because of ‘apathy’ by public representatives towards them, a former BSP leader on Monday committed suicide by setting himself ablaze in Azamgarh town. Baliram Prasad, 65, killed himself at Ambedkar Park at 11 pm, police said. “He was rushed to hospital, where he died later,” said superintendent of police V S Meena. Prasad allegedly consumed some poisonous substance before pouring kerosene...

-The Hindu Journalists need to adopt a set of integrity measures in order to police the boundaries between the market and political power   Gina Rinehart, Australia’s richest person and the world’s wealthiest woman, is seeking three board seats following her purchase of 18.7 per cent of Fairfax which owns most papers in Australia not controlled by Rupert Murdoch’s News Ltd. There has already been considerable upheaval in two of the Fairfax papers...

Census 2011 data bring into the open Maharashtra’s terrible record in sex-selective abortions. In early June, Vijaymala Patekar, a mother of four girls, haemorrhaged to death at a hospital in Parli, Beed district, Maharashtra. She was reportedly in her second trimester of pregnancy. Her family had allegedly forced her to abort the foetus when they learnt it was a girl child. Sudam Munde, the doctor who performed the procedure, fled Parli but...

John Vidal, who was in Rio for the '92 Earth summit, looks back at that momentous event, and how the 2012 version compares Helicopters thundered up and down the chic Copacabana and Ipanema beaches. Tanks guarded the bridges and tunnels. The favelas were in lockdown, schools closed and supermarkets stood empty. Unexpectedly, George H W Bush, the 41st US president, flush with success at the collapse of communism, had arrived in...

The cartoon controversy provides the possibility of interrogating the functioning of the academic system to understand its relationship with the downtrodden masses. A new deliberation is needed in order to make the academic world more sensitive and responsive towards the issues and concerns of the subaltern-oppressed communities. This will be an ethical incentive for the present-day dalit movement in India and can bring greater democratisation to the education system. Harish Wankhede...