-The Hindu Building on the work by RTI activists, India needs to set up a mechanism that can make for accountability on the sources and utilisation of party funds Throughout the world, political parties collect funds to build and sustain the organisation, to train party CADres and fight elections. Recognising that they are the main link to the citizens (as voters) and, by implication, the mainstay of democracy, many countries, including India,...

-The Times of India MENDHARI (GADCHIROLI): The picturesque little hamlet of Mendhari, around 90-km from Gadchiroli town, was considered by the Naxalites as a safe haven. The tranquillity here had remained undisputed until Sunday when, for the first time, the villagers witnessed a lopsided bloodbath in which six women rebels were killed in police firing. The villagers, who claimed to have been thrashed by the C-60 commandos too, told TOI that four...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The housing ministry is thinking of setting up an institute of urban planning that will act as a think tank as well as train personnel in city planning. The Prime Minister will chair the governing body of the institute, which will be located in Delhi. The Delhi Development Authority has sanctioned five acres for the institute, to be built with a budget of Rs 300 crore. The government plans...

-The Hindu Chronic corruption and lack of affordable access to treatments for serious diseases in the public health system stand exposed in the kidney commerce scandal in Tamil Nadu's Dharmapuri district. Nothing can be a greater irony than the existence of such thriving sale of organs in a State that also has perhaps the best-run programme for donation of kidneys, livers, hearts and lungs by deceased donors. It is no small...

-The Business Standard Data also show that several other leading domestic pharma companies have recalled their products from the US Frequent drug recalls, warning letters and import alerts from the US in the recent past have turned into a major concern for the Indian pharmaceutical industry and investors. While Ranbaxy Laboratories recently pleaded guilty before the US authorities for its wrongdoings in the past, the crackdown on the drug companies seems to...