-DNA On July 18, 2012, social activist TJ Abraham had filed a complaint with the court stating that while constructing the NICE Road, huge tracts of land has been grabbed illegally. The land belonged to poor people and farmers and has been purchased for lesser price than the market value. NICE for its project has occupied 20,193 acres land in total, in which it illegally encroached around 5,972 acres, Abraham had filed...

-Outlook Shimla: As many as 146 candidates contesting the upcoming Himachal Pradesh Assembly elections are 'crorepatis', according to a NGO report. The study conducted by Himachal Pradesh Election Watch, an NGO generating awareness among voters, also found that assets of 54 MLAs, re-contesting polls this year, grew on an average by 172 per cent since the 2007 elections. Leading the table is Brij Behari Lal Butail of Congress from Palampur constituency with assets...

-The Indian Express The Rajat Gupta case provokes a question: Could the Indian system handle such a situation as well? Rajat Gupta has got two years in prison for insider trading, a FRAction of the term sought by the prosecution. It is a fair sentence, delivered without regard for the multiple pressures that had been brought to bear on this much-publicised case. The handling of the case — among about 60 others...

-The Times of India CHANDIGARH: Hours before he was removed from the land consolidation department, Haryana's whistleblower IAS officer Ashok Khemka had FRAmed a few novel rules to put an end to FRAudulent benami land deals in the state. In his last-ditch effort to rein in land sharks, Khemka, the then inspector general of registration, on October 10, made the Aadhaar number issued by the Unique Identification Authority of India mandatory for...

-The Hindu Women continue to be invisible to planners, despite their high levels of contribution to the national economy, says a UN Women paper on women and forests Some of the present policies in forest management are detrimental to the poor, particularly women, states a UN Women paper by NC Saxena, member National Advisory Council, even as he suggests changes that could ameliorate their condition. Despite economic growth, gender inequalities in “critical human development...