-The Hindustan Times In a first sign of dissent within the UPA government over the recent Rs. 7 hike in petrol prices, defence minister AK Antony on Tuesday said it was “not a correct step”. Antony's remarks came soon after he landed at Neyyattinkara in Kerala to campaign for Congress candidate R Selvaraj for the June 2 assembly by-elections. “The hike in petrol price was not a correct step. The oil companies should...

School texts that teach young minds that politics is a contentious and critical but reasonable activity, that it is not merely a set of demands and commands, and that politicians have to be responsive and accountable are naturally disliked by the political class. This is the tone of all the Political Science textbooks of Standards IX-XI brought out after 2006. The nurturing of a culture of critical public opinion seems...

-The Times of India In a concerted strategy to hit at PM Manmohan Singh, just days after it leveled charges of corruption against top Cabinet ministers, Team Anna member Prashant Bhushan said the PM was like 'Shikhandi' and was being used by Congress as a shield. Bhushan on Monday slammed Singh for defending the UPA government on corruption charges. "The Congress is using the PM as a shield like 'Shikhandi'. They say...

The thrust of Prabhat Patnaik's argument (“Parliament's say extends to the classroom,” The Hindu , May 22, 2012) is clear. It is to declare illegitimate the arguments against government action on the recent textbook controversy. What is this hullabaloo about, Patnaik seems to be saying: what is under threat is not the status of critical pedagogy in the textbooks but the jurisdiction of the Parliament. The larger argument within Patnaik's polemic...

Gurgaon, with 20.9% household internet penetration, scored better than IT hubs like Bangalore and Hyderabad in Census 2011. But high internet use is leading to increase in the number of internet addicts in the city. Addictions have always been associated with substance abuse that alters the chemical balance of the brain. Recent research shows that one can even experience a high, from excessive use of the internet. Internet addicts experience a...