-Express News Service   The best way to save a project is to make its beneficiaries responsible for it. At least that was the idea of the previous LDF Government when it mooted the formation of village-level social audit officers for the transparent implementation of NREGS (National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme) in the state. The new government has also decided to go forward with the idea and has included the formation...

“Government can no longer convince people its hands are clean” A former Union Revenue Secretary, E.A.S. Sarma, has accused the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) of turning a “blind eye” to his repeated warnings about “alleged irregularities” committed in auditing capital costs and allowing price and other concessions to the Mukesh Ambani-owned Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) in the KG basin and Cairn India in Rajasthan. In a letter addressed to Prime Minister Manmohan...

This paper was presented at the Regional Workshop on War on Terror and Asian Democracy 17 May 2011, Kim Dae-Jung Convention Centre, South Korea organised by Solidarity for Democratization Movement in Asia (SDMA) Introduction In the discourse on terrorism and counter terrorism, September 11 stands as a watershed because of the attack on the World Trade Centre in 2001. Government of India (GoI) also took full advantage of the ‘War on Terror’...

-The Indian Express   The self-appointed representatives of civil society would like to remind us that the trouble with our politics is that you have absolutely no idea what sort of person might wind up being on top. Horrific and untidy, isn’t it? “Suppose tomorrow, a corrupt person like Madhu Koda or A. Raja or any of the Reddy Brothers became prime minister,” is a worry that runs through a letter...

-DNA   West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee today expressed dismay at the PILed up files and papers strewn in the Food department headquarters and asked officials to prepare a computer database of all papers, documents and files. During her sudden visit to the 'Khadya Bhavan' (food department headquarters) on Mirza Ghalib street, the chief minister met officers and employees and sought to know the system by which the applications for ration cards...