-The Hindu Year 2015 will be crucial as shale oil firms begin to feel the pinch of low prices Are falling oil prices good or bad for the global economy? And how do they work for India? Till recently these questions were no-brainers. Cheaper oil is obviously good for the global economy; for an energy-intensive economy such as India's, which also depends on imported oil for meeting four-fifths of its needs, a...

-Frontline SHUBHANKAR DAM, Assistant Professor of Law at Singapore Management University School of Law, is the author of Presidential Legislation in India: The Law and Practice of Ordinances (Cambridge University Press, 2014), which has received wide acclaim among scholars of constitutional law. Against the backdrop of his insightful critique on the necessity of ordinances in a democracy, Professor Dam discusses in this interview the recent controversy triggered by the Bharatiya Janata...

-The United Nations After three months of stability, the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization's (FAO) Food Price Index declined in December, meaning the index fell over the course of 2014 for the third consecutive year. The 1.7 per cent fall in December, which comes after the index had appeared to bottom out last month, was credited to continued large supplies and record stocks, combined with a strong US dollar and falling...

-The Guardian Universal healthcare is often presented as an idealistic goal that remains out of reach for all but the richest nations. That's not the case, writes Amartya Sen. Look at what has been achieved in Rwanda, Thailand and Bangladesh Twenty-five hundred years ago, the young Gautama Buddha left his princely home, in the foothills of the Himalayas, in a state of agitation and agony. What was he so distressed about?...

-The Hindu Are differences within the middle class, in income, education, and cultural and social capital, so wide as to render moot any ideological or behavioural coherence to this group? The rapid growth of the Indian economy over the past three decades has led to a substantial expansion of India's "middle class". This has triggered a robust debate over who in India actually belongs to the "middle class," its size, composition, and...