India’s apex planning body may cap national poverty at 32% for the purpose of calculating welfare benefits in the 12th Five-year Plan that starts on 1 April 2012, it said a day before a meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. The development comes on a day the Supreme Court asked Montek Singh Ahluwalia to respond why it should not strike down an earlier cap of 36% poverty after the government sought...

Irom Sharmila Chanu and Anna Hazare have one thing in common – the ability to fast indefinitely for what they perceive is right. But the similarities end there. She has been on a political fast for 11 years but her silent resilience moves you when you realize the sheer magnitude of what she is single-handedly trying to achieve. Far from the glare of studio lights of television channels and tangled wires of...

Given the scale of corruption in India, the constitution of a Jan Lokpal will be a welcome initiative. But the proposed Lokpal has the makings of a super-monster. After 42 years of hesitation and uncertainty, an institutional mechanism to deal with the all-pervasive incidence of corruption in India is in sight. What apparently moved the state machinery was the agitation spearheaded by Anna Hazare, which drew spontaneous support primarily in the...

As young middle-class Indians gathered to express their anger at corrupt governance, it was a significant moment for Indian democracy. The country has witnessed many protests for wages and land, self-determination and human rights. But this campaign was different. It's decades since educated and privileged young people felt stirred enough to take to the streets, seeking hope of a better India. But this is not a one-time eruption and the...

Itself the outcome of a bottom-up movement, the Jan Lokpal bill ironically proposes a centralised framework against graft. Without checks and balances. There was never any doubt that India needs a strong Lokpal Act. The protest has paved the way for its enactment. With the exultation over the anti-corruption campaign’s ‘victory’ quieting down, it’s time to take stock. Nuanced arguments—and indeed substance—have to recover lost ground to take the discourse...