-Scroll.in On Thursday, the Act was extended for another six months in Nagaland. The Assam Rifles men at the Ramva village post were used to being welcomed by the villagers and asked to join Christmas celebrations. This year, too, they went to Ramva bearing Christmas gifts: two new volleyballs and a net. They were shocked when the villagers refused to accept the gifts. Then the Assam Rifles men tried to pose for a...

-The Hindu Business Line At present, panchayats make no contribution to the design of schemes. Their autonomy is negligible. This needs to change Decentralisation has long been recognised as an efficient instrument for promoting economic democracy, and delivering services to meet the needs of people. There are three different channels for decentralisation — political, administrative and fiscal. Political decentralisation promotes trust and cooperation between government agencies and citizens. Administrative decentralisation enables authority...

-The Hindu It allows employers to extend unlimited advances to workers and charge an unspecified interest rate on such loans Debt bondage is a form of slavery that exists when a worker is induced to accept advances on wages, of a size, or at a level of interest, such that the advance will never be repaid. One of India’s hastily-passed Labour Codes — the Code on Wages, 2019 — gives legal sanction...

-The Telegraph Anticipating an attempt to bring the bill to Rajya Sabha on Tuesday, the Congress has issued a whip to its members to be present in the House all day  The government on Monday used its brute majority in the Lok Sabha to railroad a bill that provides for Aadhaar-linking of the electoral rolls, allowing just nominal discussion amid a din and attracting Opposition charges of “killing democracy”. Critics of the Election...

-NetworkIdeas.org The very day, December 11, when the Indian finance ministry spuriously claimed a robust recovery in the post-pandemic Indian economy, newspapers carried news of an acceleration in the US inflation rate. The inflation rate in November 2021 over November of the preceding year had been 6.8 per cent in the US, which was higher than the corresponding rate in any month over the previous 40 years; in particular, petrol prices...