A classroom reflecting life's diversity will benefit children of all strata while enriching teaching experience. Now that the Supreme Court has validated the Right to Education (RTE), its success will depend on teachers. When I said this to a friend who teaches in a primary school, she said, “you are being unfair.” I was startled to hear this response because what I had said was common sense. When I pointed this...

The Supreme Court on Friday pulled up the Kerala government for enacting legislation to circumvent its or High Court judgments. Kerala was the only State where it was telling citizens not to obey the law, said a Bench of Justices D.K. Jain and Anil R. Dave. Hearing an appeal against an interim order of the Kerala High Court staying a provision of the Kerala Public Ways (Restriction of Assemblies and Processions)...

The attack on corruption should not turn into disregard and contempt for institutions. The educated middle class in India is naturally exercised over the corruption that is widely prevalent in public life. With growing concern over corruption there is growing indignation. This indignation is expressed on various public occasions, sometimes passionately, but often in a purely routine manner. Every public institution and every public office, civil as well as military, is...

When universities start censoring speech and banning books, and permission is needed to hold conferences, we risk becoming a hollow, illiberal democracy. Do you need the administration's prior permission to hold a meeting, seminar, symposium or conference at a university? Most academics in liberal democracies would either be astounded by the question or feel compelled to answer it with an emphatic, if not vehement, no. The administration, they would argue, should...

 If the data provided by the Union government is to be believed, various bigwigs of the Congress, the Communist parties, the socialists and the Janata Party have been placed in the list of "freedom fighters". Prominent among these are Giani Zail Singh, P V Narasimha Rao, Neelam Sanjiva Reddy, Darbara Singh, Morarji Desai, Biju Patnaik, Devi Lal, R Venkataraman, Kamla Bahuguna, Babubhai Patel, Lalita Shastri (wife of Lal Bahadur Shastri), Indrani...