The Central Vigilance Commission (CVC), probing alleged financial bungling in the Commonwealth Games-related projects, has referred certain cases to the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to check whether there was violation of foreign exchange laws. Official sources said that projects like construction of Commonwealth Games Village near Akshardham temple and flyovers, hiring and procurement of medical and fitness equipment and conduct of outdoor publicity campaign by the Organising Committee may come under the...

A lot has been said and written about the visit of Barack Obama, the President of USA to India. The corporate media was in the usual over-enthusiastic drive to bring to its readers and viewers all minute details about his visit from where he stayed and what he ate to how many warships, planes and cars accompanied him and how a whopping $200 million was spent per day for the...

Every afternoon at about four, a slight woman named Runi slips out of the cramped, airless room that she shares with her husband and their sixteen children. She skirts the drainage ditch in front of the building, then walks toward the pile of hardened dung cakes that people in this slum on the edge of the northeastern Indian city of Patna use for fuel. Dressed in a bright-yellow sari shot...

The government has assured full support to Indian companies exploring opportunities to acquire agricultural land in Africa for cultivation of pulses in order to deal with its domestic shortage. "We import pulses and we will be more supportive of more land being brought under cultivation and for value addition. India is the market and we have been investing in agriculture...," Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma had said. With the unabated...

A patent is an artificial property right; it is created by the government, and would not exist if there were no government or if it did not grant patents. It is then for the government to decide whether to grant a patent or not. But a government would not normally make the decision arbitrarily; it would follow some rules. The rules universally followed are novelty, non-obviousness and commercial value. A...