-NDTV In his maiden appearance after being named Uttar Pradesh chief minister, Yogi Adityanath proclaimed that his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government would maintain a laser-like focus on the twin themes of combating corruption and restoring law and order. "In the past 15 years," Adityanath noted, "UP lagged behind in the race of development as previous governments indulged in corruption, nepotism, and failed on the law order front." Indeed, one of...

-Scroll.in India’s first chief statistician, Pronab Sen, is now country director of the International Growth Centre, which seeks to build effective growth facilities through engagement between policymakers and researchers. In this interview to Scroll.in, he speaks on the 50 days of demonetisation, its failings, its severe impact on the poor, the loss of credibility of the Reserve Bank of India, the push to make India a cashless or less-cash economy, and...

-HardNewsMedia.com A lack of jobs and an abundant workforce have meant that the agrarian states of India have become tinderboxes waiting to catch fire Statistics released by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB)’s annual report, “Crime in India”, reveal that in 2015, the number of ‘agrarian riots’ have increased by a whopping 327 percent. The number of cases of ‘agrarian rioting’ increased from 628 to 2,683 in one year. The bulk of...

-Hindustan Times New Delhi: The government has refused to divulge information about riot control weapons and ammunition used to disperse protesters, saying this was “sensitive defence information” and making it public could jeopardise the country’s security. A Delhi-based rights activist Venkatesh Nayak had filed a right to information (RTI) request asking the Ordnance Factory Board for details on the sale of weapons and ammunition, particularly pellet shotguns that have injured thousands of...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: Tens of thousands of people who relocated from riot-torn areas of Muzaffarnagar to areas with minority concentration find themselves out of the government's grid even three years after the violence forced them to flee their homes. This is the main finding of a survey conducted by NGOs Aman Biradari and Afkar India of the 65 colonies that have come up in Muzaffarnagar and Shamli to house the 30,000...