Sikkim now needs to adopt mechanism to sustain assets that it has created under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) programme. A research team from country's premier rural management institute - the Institute of Rural Management, Anand ( IRMA) - which evaluated MGNREGA's implementation in the North Eastern state has suggested this to the Sikkim government. Sikkim is the only state which has bagged three national awards...

Indian cotton was once infamously plundered by the British to benefit their finished goods economy back home. The world-famous Dhaka muslin were woven with desi cotton. But while the foreign regime kept the Indian cotton alive, albeit for its own gains, independent India presided over its complete decimation. However, after about 50 years of domination of American cotton that had edged out the desi varieties for long, the Indian Council of...

The number of Right to Information (RTI) applications received by the Pune Municipal Corporation has increased from 6,793 in 2009 to 10,552 in 2010, in spite of the civic body providing information to citizens every Monday from 3 to 5 pm. While civic officials cited the increased awareness about the RTI Act among citizens as reason for the rising number of applications, activists said that the Monday scheme has not been...

In a setback to CBI, the Supreme Court on Friday upholds life sentence for Dara Singh, who killed Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two minor sons in January 22, 1999. A bench comprising Justices P Sathasivam and B S Chauhan, while dismissing the agency's plea for death penalty, said the punishment can be imposed only in the "rarest of rare" cases depending upon the facts and situation of each case. The...

New CRZ notification sparks off fears, upsets fisherfolk The new Coastal Zone Regulation (CRZ) 2011 which has opened up construction along the sea has sparked off fears of Mumbai being ringed with high rises and mutating into a ‘desi' Manhattan. It has triggered furious debates on development and upset the fisherfolk who are planning to hit the streets across the country to agitate for better coastal protection. Since 1991 when the first...