-Hindustan Times An MLA speaking in the House must withdraw his words immediately and cannot argue when the assembly speaker terms as “unparliamentary” any word or parts of a sentence by the lawmaker, the amended rules say. Bhopal: Madhya Pradesh legislators can’t ask in the assembly questions on communal riots, sensitive events, confidential issues, and any query that may encourage secessionism or threaten the country’s unity, according to changes in House rules,...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Farmer suicides declined by nearly 10% in 2016 as compared to a year earlier, though the rate at which farmers took their lives continued to be at least one every hour. Maharashtra continues to be at the top in recording the highest number of farmer suicides in India. Provisional figures for the year 2016, disclosed by agriculture ministry in Lok Sabha on Tuesday, show that the...

-Livemint.com The only way to solve the farmers’ problem is to make entry to other sectors attractive by creating employment opportunities, and to make it easy to exit farming Farmers have a bad romance with the Indian polity. On the one hand, India loves, even worships, these farmers. On the other, Indian policymakers create the most impossible regulatory environment for the agricultural sector, trapping farmers in a low-income, low-productivity occupation. The latest...

-The Indian Express Several commissions were either not functioning or functioning at reduced capacity as posts of Commissioners, including those of Chief Information Commissioners, were vacant during the period under review. A recent study to assess the performance of Information Commissions (ICs) by non-government organisations Satark Nagrik Sangathan (SNS) and Centre for Equity Studies (CES) has found several shortcomings in their functioning, which impact the effectiveness of the Right to Information...

-The Hindu The Supreme Court directs that public servants can only be arrested with the written permission of their appointing authority. The anti-atrocities law, which protects Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes from casteist slurs and discrimination, has become an instrument to “blackmail” innocent citizens and public servants, the Supreme Court observed in a judgment on Tuesday. Issuing a slew of guidelines to protect public servants and private employees from arbitrary arrests under the...