-The Hindu They have not got many of the benefits that the new Laws threaten to take away. As the movement against the agricultural reform Laws builds towards its one year anniversary, it is clear that the bulk of farmers in eastern Indian States have not been as motivated to join the agitation as their counterparts in the northwest, as they have not even experienced many of the benefits that the Laws...

-Hindustan Times Ashish Mishra, son of Union minister of state for home affairs Ajay Mishra ‘Teni’, has been named as an accused in a murder first information report (FIR) lodged on Monday. The court was exceptionally harsh while commenting on the police’s lenient handling of Mishra, although it didn’t name him. The Supreme Court on Friday pulled up the Uttar Pradesh government for not immediately arresting Ashish Mishra, son of Union minister...

-Hindustan Times The Union environment ministry has come out with a consultation paper on amending the Forest Conservation Act 1980 to bring significant changes to forest governance in India including facilitating private plantations for harvesting and exploration or extraction of oil and natural gas deep beneath forest land by drilling holes from outside the forest areas. Here are the highlights of the environment ministry’s proposal: Forests on private land Until December 1996, provisions of...

-Hindustan Times The BJP leadership has explicitly instructed the cadre to reinforce that the ongoing farm protests are “motivated” and an attempt to “destabilise” the country, a party functionary claimed The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has redoubled efforts to distance the farmer protests from the farm issues ahead of elections in states such as Punjab and Uttar Pradesh, where the demand from a section of farmers’ for repealing the farm Laws enacted...

-The Telegraph The observation came following a request from attorney-general K.K. Venugopal, who was representing the Centre along with solicitor-general Tushar Mehta The Supreme Court on Monday decided to examine the constitutionality of the farmers’ right to protest on a sub-judice issue, particularly when the controversial farm Laws had been stayed and were “not in force”. The court said the “central issue” was “whether the right to protest is an absolute right”. It also...