While Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan is proud that the State has an impressive 98.69 per cent disposal rate of requests under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, the murder of two campaigners who used the law to good effect is a blot. First, it was Satish Shetty at Talegaon, near Pune, who was killed on January 13, and more recently DAttatray Patil at Ichalkaranji, in Kolhapur district, on May 22....

Amitabh Bachchan says that if ever asked about his caste by Census enumerators, his answer would be: Caste – Indian. That, of course, would do little more than stoke the media's bollywood feeding frenzy yet again. Shyam Maharaj is no Bachchan. Nor is his brother, Chaitanya Prabhu. But they and the followers of their fraternity will likely throw up far more complex answers — and questions — if Census enumerators...

Orissa will soon have an e-surveillance mechanism for pest Attack through use of scientific tools so that the farmers are benefited and remedial actions can be initiated by the agriculture department. “Scientists working under the Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology, must change their strategy and include climate change as their research focus area and also impact patterns to help farmers,” said agriculture production commissioner R.N. Senapati at state-level research council...

The Supreme Court on Wednesday said it was incumbent upon the Haryana government to provide protection to the victims of caste violence in Mirchpur village in Hisar district. The apex court bench of Justices G.S. Singhvi and C.K. Prasad said the failure to provide protection would be viewed seriously. The Dalits (Balmikis) of Mirchpur were targets of violence by the upper caste Jats on April 21. As many as 150...

Aruna Roy, the prominent political and social activist who spearheaded the campaign to institute the Right to Information Act in the 1990s, is an ardent critic of the anti-people and exclusionary policies of the first and the second United Progressive Alliance governments. A recipient of the Ramon Magsaysay Award for community leadership in 2000, she heads the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathana (a trade union of workers and peasants) in Rajasamand, Rajasthan,...