The historian Ramachandra Guha has famously described India as a fifty-fifty democracy. But even admirers of India as a functioning democracy will perhaps be forced to admit that certain events in 2010 forced the needle to move beyond fifty against democracy. Threats to democracy and democratic rights have never been as evident, and as powerful, since the dark days of the Emergency in 1975-76 as they were in the course...

I am very upset about the court decision in Chhattisgarh about Binayak Sen. It is a huge perversion of our system of justice, and particularly of the laws concerning sedition. It’s not at all clear, to start with, that the thing he has been exactly accused of — of passing letters — has been really proved beyond doubt. Secondly, even if this were correct, that doesn’t amount to sedition. He hasn’t...

Indian law affords Binayak Sen one automatic right to appeal, and another at the discretion of the Supreme Court. Meanwhile, given the visible disparity between the quality of allegations against him and the repercussions, the judgment is sure to provoke a national and international outcry. One thousand three hundred and twenty days after he was first arrested, Binayak Sen has been sentenced to life imprisonment for sedition against the Indian...

The CPI(M) on Wednesday said the life sentence awarded to rights activist Binayak Sen, convicted by a court in Raipur for sedition, was “a grave miscarriage of justice”. “The evidence presented at the trial by the prosecution was so flimsy and concocted that it is surprising that such a judicial verdict has been given,” party general secretary Prakash Karat said. He said the verdict also pointed to the dangers of having...

Between the technical rigour and finality of CAG audit and people's airing of grievances, a new audit system that subscribes to, and strengthens, open government may be waiting to be born. The new system is envisaged as one where the CAG’s formal audit includes the relatively new concept of community-led social audit . The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Guarantee Act, 2005 (MGNREGA) presents an opportunity to do this. Traditionally, auditing is a...