-The Guardian  Use of Sodium Pentothal to secure confessions – classified by some as torture – still common in certain regions of India It is the sort of scene that belongs in a film noir, not a 21st-century democracy: an uncooperative suspect being injected with a dose of "truth serum" in an attempt to elicit a confession. But some detectives in India still swear by so-called narcoanalysis despite India's highest court ruling...

-The Economic Times Piyush Khanolkar, a 38-year-old farmer from the Marathwada district of Maharashtra, has just sold off 10 gm of gold which he had accrued over a period of last five years to a local jeweller. With good rains not in sight yet, he has been forced to sell off the gold to create a corpus to meet his family needs in the coming months if there is a crop failure. Prabhu...

-Reuters A shortfall in monsoon rains has widened to nearly 50 percent of average in the past week, making a revival next week crucial for farmers to sow summer-planted crops such as rice, corn, cane, cotton and soybean. The annual rains are crucial for farm output and economic growth as about 55 percent of the South Asian nation's arable land is rain-fed. Farm sector accounts for about 15 percent of a nearly $2-trillion...

-The Hindu State says Constitution does not allow government spending for religious bodies The Supreme Court has declined to stay, at this stage, the Gujarat High Court order directing the State government to pay compensation to more than 500 shrines damaged during the 2002 riots. Earlier, appearing for the Gujarat government before Justices K.S. Radhakrishnan and Dipak Misra, Additional Advocate-General Tushar Mehta and counsel Hemantika Wahi argued that under the Constitution, there could...

-The Indian Express Senior advocate Mukul Sinha filed a contempt of court plea against Chief Minister Narendra Modi and his council of ministers before the Gujarat High Court on Tuesday for refusing to allow the prosecution of fisheries minister Purushottam Solanki in an alleged scam worth about Rs 400 crore. Sinha, however, refused to share the details, saying it was a sensitive matter. Sinha filed the application on behalf of his client Ishaq...