-The Hindu   “Its members should not be from the government” With the impasse between the civil society and the government on the structure of the Lokpal Bill continuing, the former Chief Election Commissioner, T.N. Seshan, announced his version of the Bill on Friday, which provides for establishing an anti-graft body similar to the Election Commission. “The issue of Corruption is important to the nation and this is an accepted view on all sides,”...

-The Hindu   The Supreme Court on Friday indicated that it would examine the larger question of violation of fundamental rights raised by Bhim Singh of the Jammu and Kashmir Panthers Party in his petition against the preventive detention of Anna Hazare, and asked him to get the anti-Corruption campaigner's consent to prosecute the petition. In his petition, Mr. Singh questioned the correctness of the Delhi Police in having taken Mr. Hazare into...

The truth about the Indian media’s increasing reliance on revenues from news that has been paid for, has long been shrouded in half-truths, corporate denials and misleading information in carefully sifted reports sent out by regulatory bodies. While the national media, flush with high TRP ratings and advertising revenues, is patting itself on its self-righteous back for relentless coverage of the public protests against Corruption in high places, it is...

Even as the state tries to provide a Corruption-free government with the Lokseva Guarantee Bill, a similar venture by it earlier has fallen by the wayside. With no chief information commissioner (CIC) in the state for the past five months the much-trumpeted Right To Information (RTI) Act, which aims to bring in transparency, has almost become defunct. Incidentally, Rajasthan had taken the first steps in bringing this law in the...

Anna Hazare’s Ramlila brinkmanship flamed deep into another night despite the UPA’s many accommodations and in defiance of mounting civil society and intelligentsia opinion that the government had committed to enough on the Lokpal legislation for him to break his fast. Hazare and his core team of Arvind Kejriwal. Prashant Bhushan and Kiran Bedi remained unmoved by public and bipartisan commitment from the highest quarters that key features of their Jan...