-The Hindu   A host of political and religious leaders shared the dais at a public meeting organised by the Popular Front of India at the Ramlila Maidan here on Sunday. They demanded greater representation for Muslims in Parliament and Assemblies, besides reservation in government and private sector jobs. They wanted Muslims and other downtrodden sections of society to join hands in fighting social inequality and injustice. The meeting was organised to mark...

What is our national aim? To my mind, our national aim must be to make India a highly prosperous country for its citizens, and for that it is necessary to have a high degree of industrialization.  Even setting up and running a single primary school requires a lot of money, e.g. for buying land, erecting the school building and providing for the recurrent expenditure for salaries of teachers, staff, etc. We...

The Reserve Bank of India on Friday expressed the hope that foreign direct investment in multi-brand retail would help in bringing down inflation. “...Certainly it (FDI in multi-brand retail) would help improve supply chain and we hope it should also contribute to reducing inflation,” Reserve Bank of India Governor D. Subbarao told reporters on the sidelines of a memorial lecture here. Dr. Subbarao said 51 per cent FDI in multi-brand retail would...

The killing of Sister Valsa John over tribal rights is another episode of land dispute in the coal belt Why would 40 people kill a solitary nun in a remote village in coal-rich Dhumka in Jharkhand? Sister Valsa John is better known as an activist than a nun of the Sisters of Charity of Jesus & Mary. She left her home in Kerala and moved to Jharkhand two decades ago as...

We have five million children in the labour market, say official figures. Their actual numbers may be four times as many. As a nation, we have failed each one of them…   Millions of our children still labour today, in factories, farms, kilns, mines, homes and city waste dumps, when they should be in school or in a playground. We profoundly fail these children, collectively depriving them of education, play, rest, healthy...