-The Hindu Open-minded adoption of the RTE Act’s enabling provisions can radically transform school education Free and compulsory education of children in the 6 to 14 age group in India became a fundamental right when, in 2002, Article 21-A was inserted in the 86th Amendment to the Constitution. This right was to be governed by law, as the state may determine, and the enforcing Legislation for this came eight years later, as...

-The Indian Express Linking it to ration cards ends up denying poor their rightful entitlements In September 2017, 11-year-old Santoshi, resident of Simdega district of Jharkhand, succumbed to starvation. According to her mother, she died “asking for rice, but there was not a single grain at home”. She was deprived of her subsidised ration as her family’s ration card was cancelled because it was not linked to Aadhaar. Marandi in Jharkhand met...

-TheSundayGuardianLive.com Delhi’s problem of being covered by smoke started right after the Punjab Preservation of Subsoil Water Act in 2009, which delayed the burning of crops till late October, was implemented for the first time. Until a few years ago, when farmers in Punjab burnt the remnants of the rice crops in their fields in preparation for sowing wheat, the smoke from such fires was confined to Punjab. Back then, farmers burnt...

-MoneyLife.in The government’s penchant for painting all legitimate questions about its faulty policy-making as scaremongering or anti-national is getting rather irksome. Prime minister Narendra Modi (at the FICCI annual general meeting) and finance minister Arun Jaitley have both responded to fears over the implications of the Financial Resolution and Deposit Insurance Bill (FRDI Bill) , 2017, by lashing out at critics and reassuring people that the government will protect bank deposits....

-The Indian Express A statement by Bebaak Collective, an intervener in support of the triple talaq plea by Shayara Bano, states that it is opposed to making violation of civil contract of marriage a criminal act. New Delhi: Protesting the proposed criminalisation of instant triple talaq in the Centre’s Bill on the issue, various women’s groups have asked the government to hold wider consultations before passing the Legislation, as it affects...