-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Lok Sabha polls are not only under the watch of the Election Commission and financial agencies for corrupt practices, but also under the scanner of National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). For the first time, the agency, under instructions from the home ministry, will collect data on poll-related offences such as liquor/money distribution, communal or hate speeches, false affidavits by politicians, poll violence, bogus voting and...

-The Hindustan Times Rubina appears much older than the 40 years she admits to. She does not look you in the eye; she is hardly audible, and often trembles. Her hut, on the outskirts of Guhana village in Haryana's Mewat district, is surrounded by garbage heaps and excreta. There is no water or electricity and the hut is filled with acrid smoke from the cooking fire. "This is how our stories...

-The Hindu Just over 7% of women globally and 3% in South Asia have experienced sexual violence at the hands of a non-partner, a new global study finds. Both globally and in South Asia alone, rape by an intimate partner or member of the household is far more common than that by a stranger, the researchers found. In a study published in the medical journal, The Lancet, and released early Wednesday morning,...

-The Indian Express The gangrape may have brought the tribal councils of this West Bengal district to notoriety, but it wasn't the first sexual abuse on their orders. What is more at play here though is growing outside interference in a region considered a vote bank, writes Madhuparna Das. On January 29 evening, 900 people of a village in Birbhum district's Labhpur block gathered near the hut of their headman. The hut,...

-The Hindu Rights may be self-evident and constitutionally secured; however, they do not automatically implement themselves In the last two years the highest courts in the country have responded to a mass call for more protection for women. Alongside, there have been many judgments from non-constitutional decision-making bodies like khap panchayats and kangaroo courts sanctioning violence against particular women or curtailing women's freedom in significant ways. Why is it that while there...