-The Hindu Moratorium on Intellectual Property Complaints Switzerland and the U.S. have begun a campaign at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to not renew a moratorium on ‘non-violation complaints and situations’ for intellectual property Rights that expires at the end of the year. Intellectual property laws are governed internationally by the Trade-Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Agreement. The moratorium first came into being in 1995, when the WTO was born. And has survived...

-The Hindu Two years after vociferously arguing for an expansion of the provisions of the National Food Security Act, the BJP in government is bleeding it with a thousand cuts, both fiscal and otherwise When Parliament passed the National Food Security Act (NFSA) in 2013, it had already become one of the most debated pieces of legislation in decades. Those for and against it had fought it out across yards of space...

-The Economic Times NEW DELHI: Retired bureaucrats never retire. Stumped? A look at the information commissions, the transparency watchdogs, all over India reveals that they have become a re-employment arena for bureaucrats. Even though the Supreme Court has advised looking beyond retired civil servants for posts of information commissioners and chief information commissioners, governments prefer retired bureaucrats over candidates with specialisations in other fields. An annual study by the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative,...

-PTI Anindita Mukherjee had requested the authorities to address her as “Mx” in her certificates and the university, which has probably become the first Indian educational institution to do so, accepted the “fact”. In a first, the NALSAR Law University in Hyderabad has issued a gender-neutral graduation certificate to a student who did not wish to be identified with honorific Mr or Ms but with “Mx”. Anindita Mukherjee, who graduated this year from...

-The Indian Express As several steps taken by the Centre for the sector hangs fire, clarity and implementation of ‘Housing for All’ scheme would be the key for its success. The Union Cabinet approved its flagship ‘Housing for All’ scheme this week, with a 2022 target and a renewed emphasis on the low-income group categories by way of relaxed income limits and higher interest subvention. While the government seems to have struck...