The government is thinking of bringing in a law that would allow the National Investigation Agency to probe cases of illegal mining. The proposal for arming the NIA with this power had come from the Prime Minister’s Office. Sources said the objective was to enable the Centre to break the “mining mafia”. If passed, the proposed legislation will also enable the government to scrap leases of companies engaged in illegal operations, like...

The US Senate is expected to pass the Global Food Security Act, new legislation that would significantly expand the government's commitment to combating hunger worldwide with a broad range of measures and more money, and a special coordinator, or "food czar", to oversee implementation of these provisions across agencies. A proposed new fund would allocate several billion dollars over five years to research and development, to enhance "food security, agriculture productivity,...

International law expert Kishore Singh has been nominated as the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Right to Education. His candidature was presented by the government as well as by two judges of the International Court of Justice at The Hague, and supported by the Geneva-based Platform of NGOs on the right to education. The appointment of an Indian to such a prestigious and challenging position in the U.N. system is most opportune...

Hundreds of Dalits, under the banner of Punjab Dalit Chetna Manch, laid siege to the District Administrative Complex (DAC) and burnt the effigy of the district administration for its alleged anti-Dalit approach. Some protesters tried self-immolation, while some youngsters climbed up the rooftop of the DAC threatening to jump, but heavy police force, led by SP (City) Sukhwant Singh Gill and DSP (City-II) Swarandeep Singh managed to persuade the protesters...

PONDICHERRY, India — P.M.L. Kalayansundaram calls himself a human rights worker. He runs an organization that provides a variety of services to villagers in this area — legal aid, financial assistance to help them organize marriage and death ceremonies, and free refrigerated coffin boxes that they would otherwise have to procure at exorbitant rates from private merchants. On a recent afternoon, he told me that he had been determined from...