-Livemint.com * Only about half of the states have made any effort to reduce vacancies in police, judiciary and prisons * The legal aid system mandates that 80% of the Indian population is eligible to avail free legal services, says the report NEW DELHI: The first comprehensive analysis of India’s manpower and capacity for justice delivery has painted a bleak picture of the ecosystem in terms of its various elements —police, prisons and...

-The Indian Express In his second term, Prime Minister Modi can ensure better urbanisation through greater devolution of power, and finances, to urban local bodies. As Prime Minister Narendra Modi begins his second term with an even larger political mandate, it is time to reflect on what should be the priorities in fixing our cities. The scale of the challenge is massive whether we look at the availability of clean drinking...

-Frontline.in An RTI-based public interest petition in the Bombay High Court points out that 20 lakh EVMs that the manufacturers affirm to have delivered are “missing” from the possession of the Election Commission. Issues relating to the “vulnerability” and “unreliability” of electronic voting machines (EVMs) have come up regularly in the context of the 2019 general election. Complaints filed by opposition parties on specific instances of malfunctioning of EVMs as well as...

-The Hindu The last five years have seen consistent attacks on anti-corruption laws and institutions The popular sentiment that helped the BJP in the 2014 general election was resentment against corruption in public life. The party’s clarion call for a corruption-free India resonated with the electorate, who believed the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate when he pledged, “Na khaunga, na khane dunga (neither will I indulge in corruption, nor allow anyone else to...

-Down to Earth The use of tax incentives to attract investments is prevalent around the world. However, there is no definitive data on the global magnitude of incentives granted because not all countries collect and publicly report such data and there is no common methodology for reporting across all countries. Rough estimate by Action Aid (2013) pegs the incentives granted by developing countries from corporate income tax (CIT) at $138 billion....