-NDTV Lawmakers have to quit if they are convicted of a crime and can't stay on regardless of appeals to higher courts, the Supreme Court today said, in a big leap towards cleaning up Indian politics. The top court struck down a provision in the Representation of the People's Act (RPA) that protects convicted MPs and MLAs from disqualification if they appeal to a higher court. "The disqualification takes place from the date...

-The Hindu Six years after it was set up to challenge mainstream media discourse, kafila.org has not only provided an alternative space for critical writing, but also offered a radical model of editor-less, ad-free, voluntary journalism with a zero marketing budget Aditya Nigam, an academic and activist on the left, had long been frustrated with the nature of the Indian media. In 2002, soon after the Gujarat ‘massacres', he was a part of...

-The Indian Express A list containing details of those convicted of sexual offences in Delhi in the past three decades is now available online. Delhi Police officers said the move will help people identify the accused and prompt them to register complaints. This will help police track unreported sexual offences. The move is in line with the recommendations of the Justice Verma committee, constituted in the aftermath of the December 16 gangrape...

-Outlook Guwahati: Assam has reported the highest rate of incidence of crime against children in the Northeast, though compared at the national level the rate is pretty low at 1.03 per cent of the total number of crimes registered. Assam recorded a high of 392 cases and was followed by Manipur with 104, Mizoram with 95, Meghalaya with 91 and Arunachal Pradesh with 39, according to the latest report of the National...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The year before was tough but last year was tougher for the unborn girl child. According to the latest report of the National Crime Records Bureau, the number of gender-related foeticides leaped from 132 in 2011 to 210 in 2012 - a jump of nearly 60 per cent, making a mockery of laws that ban pre-natal diagnostic tests. The corresponding figures for 2010 and 2009 were 81 and...