-The Times of India NEW DELHI: When she saw a family all at sea in the court corridors, advocate Anjali Rajput stepped in to offer free legal aid. Like her, over 130 advocates on the panel of the Delhi State Legal Services Authority (DSLSA) offer much-needed help to citizen litigants in Delhi's 11 districts, not only in courtrooms, but also through awareness camps in schools, slums, police stations and other public...

-The Hindu The Kerala model can be implemented across India with the same secular and gender-sensitive spirit Kumari died on September 1. She had contracted leptospirosis while doing relief work in Kerala after the floods, away from her own home which had not been affected. She was a health volunteer and prominent member of the Kudumbashree Mission in her panchayat in Ernakulum district. Kumari’s work and life symbolises the spirit of Kerala...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The National Human Rights Commission has rapped the Uttar Pradesh government over the strip search of 70 girls at a government residential school in Muzaffarnagar last year. It has issued a notice to the chief secretary asking him to explain why a compensation of Rs 25,000 should not be awarded to each of the girls, and directing him to arrange for their Counselling. It has also summoned the principal...

-Livemint.com After being on the sidelines of Dalit and feminist movements for long, Dalit women are now standing up for their rights New Delhi: In 2008, seven women, aged 19-24, walked into a police station in Haryana’s Indri village in Kurukshetra district. Dressed in salwar-kameez with dupattas draped around their necks, they looked tired but confident, angry and brimming with questions. They wanted to meet the SHO and ask why no FIR...

-The Hindu Punjab needs a sober, well-thought-out strategy to deal with drug abuse During the campaign for the Punjab Assembly elections last year, Amarinder Singh, then the Congress’s chief ministerial candidate, had pledged to eradicate the State’s drug problem within four weeks of coming to power. Given the complexity of the issue, hardly anyone took his pledge seriously but it did convey his concern. After coming to power, Capt. Singh took little...