-The Hindu   With her passing, Indian feminism has lost one of its earliest icons Three years ago, almost to the day, when we launched Vina Mazumdar's memoir, Memories of a Rolling Stone, the room at the Habitat Centre in Delhi was packed to overflowing. Resplendent in her beautiful silk, Vinadi, as she was known to everyone around her, smiled her way through the evening as bureaucrats, academics, politicians, educationists, feminists and others...

-The Hindu   Neha Khator narrates the story of an NGO that transformed a backward village into a bustling city, with funds, of course, but also by fostering a sense of duty in its residents. Vimla Kanwar, a 70-year-old widow, had a problem. After her husband, a handloom yarn spinner, died of cancer, the officials at the Khadi Gram Udyog took away his charkha. Concerned about finding a means of survival at her...

-Countercurrents.org   The events of last over two decades have shown us, more than before that the efforts of dividing the nation by communal forces have been a major obstacle to social peace and process of development. In India while the communal violence began with the Jabalpur riot of 1961, it is from last couple of decades especially from 1980s that the divisive politics has tried to drive a wedge between different...

-The Indian Express The Right to Education (RTE) Act to ensure students from economically weaker sections (EWS) get 25 per cent reservation in admissions has left much to be desired at the ground level as far as execution is concerned. Education officials have pointed out some loopholes that enable private schools to take it easy. As per the latest GR, flying squads have to be formed in every district to ensure schools comply...

-The Hindu The Supreme Court on Monday declined to stay a Gujarat High Court judgment upholding the constitutional validity of the Centre's Scholarship scheme for minority students in the State. The High Court, in a majority decision in February, had rejected the Narendra Modi government's contention that the pre-matriculation Scholarship scheme was discriminatory, and directed it to implement it. Justices P. Sathasivam and M.Y. Eqbal, while issuing notice on the government's appeal against...