After seeking reply from Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Gas Transportation Infrastructure Ltd (RGTIL) and others on Monday, the Supreme Court on Thursday again issued notice to the firm, the ministry of petroleum and others on another batch of petitions filed by land owners from Surat seeking adequate compensation from the company for using their land for laying gas pipelines to transport natural gas from Krishna-Godavari basin to Gujarat. A Bench headed by...

How often, in the recent past, have you opened your morning newspaper and been confronted with the smiling image of a pretty bride, only to realise that the girl in the picture has taken her own life following ‘harassment’ or ‘abuse’ in her marital home? And how many times can you recall the girl’s parents filing a criminal complaint against the husband and/or in-laws, citing extreme mental or physical abuse,...

The 97th Indian Science Congress is in session at Thiruvananthapuram (January 3 to 7, 2010), the capital of the state of Kerala. For me, every session of the Congress is a new experience; an experience of learning and re-dedication to the cause propounded by the country’s first Prime Minister, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru. It is a matter of pride for the scientific community in the country that it is the Prime...

Beware. If you are poor, go to a municipal or government hospital and seek medical help, chances are that anything can be done to you and if it affects your life or livelihood, there is nothing can be done to secure protection even if it is a case of medical negligence. Because, when you do not pay, you are getting things "not for a consideration" and when that consideration -- fees...

Much like the tsunami waves that devastated many coastal areas five years ago, the closing weeks of 2009 saw an ill wind sweeping across many of our democratic institutions, highlighting that beneath the veneer of the nation’s aspirations towards great power status was a crumbling institutional core. To look at the fourth estate first. The preface to the Press Council of India’s “Norms of Journalistic Conduct” has a section that...