-The Indian Express Amid the clamour to establish fast-track courts for rape cases, the numbers tell a different story in Rajasthan, where such courts were first set up. While the conviction rate in rape cases has stayed the same and pendency has barely improved, authorities admit that due to hurried trials, a fair share of convictions are overturned in the high court. All rape cases were transferred to fast-track courts in Rajasthan...

-The Economic Times The CBI manual contradicts the government's stance that it did no wrong in vetting the draft status report of the agency's probe in the coal allocation case, say legal experts, former CBI officials and activists. The manual says while CBI's superintendence is vested in the central government, its supervising authority is the Central Vigilance Commission in case of investigation of offences alleged to have been committed under the...

-Live Mint Why do the central and state govts deliberately undermine the constitutionally created panchayats? The collector of any district in India would be heading 100 to 150 committees related to various development initiatives in the area. Collectors often don't get time to prepare for or preside over the meetings of these committees-imagine what happens to implementation then. On the other hand, the heads of district panchayats and municipalities in the...

-The Hindu   Union Cabinet gives nod for Street Vendors Bill which will see certificates being issued to at least one crore hawkers across the country On Labour Day, the Union Cabinet announced a bonanza for street vendors - an end to ‘licence raj' - by giving its consent to the Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Bill, 2013. The Bill which is aimed at regulating street vending and shielding...

-Down to Earth For RTI activists of Bihar the cost of exposing corruption is life Twenty-year-old Rahul Kumar, a right to information (RTI) activist, knew the land mafia was behind his parents' murder. His mother and father were involved in a land dispute in Muzaffarpur's Sirisia Jagdish village. Barely a week after filing an RTI application to seek information about the murderers, Kumar was kidnapped. A day later, on March 10, 2012,...