-The Friday Times How are demographics changing in Assam and Bengal? And what does this mean for 'indigenous' communities? Garga Chatterjee considers the argument for territorial purity The Assam state of the Indian Union has seen violence flare up suddenly from July 6th. With more than 40 people reported dead and upwards of one and a half lakh displaced in a week, the Kokrajhar riots between Bodos and Muslims have again brought...

-The Hindu Public Interest Litigation is a good thing when it is used to enforce the rights of the disadvantaged. But it has now been diluted to interfere with the power of the government to take decisions on a range of policy matters Judicial activism is not an easy concept to define. It means different things to different persons. Critics denounce judicial decisions as activist when they do not agree with them....

-The Hindu The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has issued notices, returnable in four weeks, to the Jammu & Kashmir Chief Secretary and the Union Defence Secretary seeking a reply on media reports which claimed that Hilal Ahmad Dar (26) of Aloosa was killed by Army jawans. The security guard is said to have been killed in a fake encounter in Ashtingoo in Bandipora on the night of July 24. Locals allege...

-The Telegraph India is watching three Dutch and Danish non-government organisations that have allegedly “cultivated” voluntary organisations in the Northeast to gather data for anti-India reports to be presented to the United Nations. Officials of these foreign agencies may face visa restrictions too. Reports prepared by voluntary organisations on Human Rights violations by the security forces in India’s northeastern states, particularly Manipur, have become “base material” for reports to the UN that are...

Apparently, people across the country, bridging class, caste and income divides, are deliberately ensuring that girls are simply not born. The child sex ratio of 914 girls per 1,000 boys is a tragic situation and a poor reflection on India’s growth and development. This is in spite of laws, schemes, relentless activism and media campaigns spanning three decades in support of the girl child. According to activists and economists, a...