Indian Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram is the nation's domestic security chief, overseeing a broad portfolio that includes battling a homegrown Maoist insurgency and routing out terrorists. The 65-year-old, a veteran of the ruling Congress Party who previously held senior economic posts and played a key role in the country's post-1991 liberalization, is considered a future contender for the post of prime minister. Recently, he spoke to The Wall Street Journal. Here...

The RSS-sponsored Samajik Kumbh at Mandla, which is known for considerable tribal population and sizeable church presence, has created a sense of unease among Christians who fear they may be targets. The Kumbh — where lakhs of people are expected to gather from February 10  to 12 — at Mandla, 95 km from here, is being seen as a show of strength by the RSS. There is buzz that it is...

Even as the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act enters its sixth year, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar said in Delhi on Thursday that cash transfers were the answer to the eternal questions about inefficiencies in government schemes. He had tried out direct cash transfers in his effort to give Bihar’s girls bicycles, he said, and discovered that the programme had a “92 per cent success rate”. No programme, he said,...

Sanjay Dixit is a member of the Central Employment Guarantee Council, a statutory body set up under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). He was initially chosen by Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi to head an NREGA cell in Uttar Pradesh where he has become an official whistleblower of sorts, unearthing several instances of fund diversion in many districts. He talks about the malaise in the five-year-old law that...

A leading Indian social worker has returned a prestigious government award in protest against corruption. Ramon Magsaysay award winner Sandeep Pandey was honoured for his raising awareness about the government's jobs-for-work scheme. One of the world's biggest social welfare schemes, it guarantees 100 days of work a year for every rural home. Mr Pandey returned the award in protest against "embezzlement" of funds meant for the poor in Uttar Pradesh state. In a statement,...