-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Samajwadi Party on Tuesday said it would rally political parties for amending the Constitution to annul the twin Supreme Court verdicts that legislators be disqualified automatically on conviction and those in jail be barred from contesting elections. SP general secretary Ramgopal Yadav told TOI, "We will talk to political leaders for Parliament to amend the Constitution so that nobody can stop politicians from contesting elections." While the...

-The Indian Express Legal solutions to political problems are usually too blunt to be useful The Supreme Court has decided that legislators who have been convicted must resign, rather than be allowed to sit through their terms as they appeal their cases. The Representation of the People Act gives serving MPs and MLAs a pass, if they are in the process of appealing - which can take years, given the slow and...

-PTI NEW DELHI: About three-fourth of Indians say corruption has increased in the past two years and an equal number term the phenomenon a problem, a global study by Transparency International said today. Transparency International's Global Corruption Barometer 2013 report revealed that while 40 per cent of the respondents in India felt corruption has increased a lot, 31 per cent said that it has increased in the past two years. Similarly, 47...

-PTI Survey said 27% of respondents had paid a bribe, the most direct experience of corruption for a person, with police the most often bribed institution One in four people paid a bribe in dealing with public services and institutions in the past year, according to a global corruption survey. In the world's largest assessment of public opinion on the subject, Transparency International found that political parties are considered the most corrupt institutions,...

-The Hindu Political parties are ‘deeply concerned' and even ‘outraged' at the Supreme Court verdict that any person in custody - whether convicted or not - could not contest elections. Even as they had apprehensions, politicians had ‘cautiously welcomed' the verdict, which disqualified convicted lawmakers from holding office or contesting polls. But the judgment barring those imprisoned from fighting polls has opened up prospects of a confrontation between the Judiciary and the...