-The Hindu Chennai: Completely unprepared for disasters: the hospitals in Chennai — private as well as government — were particularly vulnerable, improvising solutions as the situation developed. As water levels rose, Chennai saw every single system associated with modern life abysmally fail —houses collapsed, roads caved in, communication networks went down, sewage pipelines were wrecked, and carcasses floated on roads. Patients in government and private hospitals across the city took a beating. Completely...

-The Times of India MUMBAI: Over 300 persons have been prosecuted under Maharashtra's new beef ban law since it was enacted eight months ago. The state government provided this information to the Bombay high court, where it has rejected the claim that people who consume beef constitute a "cultural minority". In its affidavit before a division bench of Justices Abhay Oka and S C Gupte, which is hearing petitions challenging the beef ban,...

-The Times of India Businessman Rajesh Varkharia thought he was waging a lonely legal battle till a chance meeting with two other dowry accused at the Bangalore trial court. "I was totally in the dark. I would just sign where the lawyer asked me to," he says, describing his five days in prison as an accused under the section 498A of the Indian Penal Code, the dowry harassment act. Varkharia and three others...

-Hindustan Times Chandigarh/Patiala: After a bumper paddy crop, the fields are on fire in Punjab and Haryana, polluting the air with hazardous particles. Strangely, there wasn’t much hue and cry till a thick blanket of smog — a mixture of smoke and fog — enveloped Delhi, making city residents breathless. It’s the farmers of the two food-bowl states who are being blamed for the sudden deterioration in air quality and smog in...

-Hindustan Times The Supreme Court has decided to examine Islamic personal law to consider doing away with provisions biased against Muslim women, often victims of polygamy and the triple talaq system, a controversial move that may upset a section of the community that has resisted reform. A bench of justices AR Dave and AK Goel requested Chief Justice of India HL Dattu to constitute an appropriate bench and address the issue to...