-The Hindu   The government has finalised rules for the implementation of the country's new nuclear liability that aim to meet the concern of American nuclear suppliers wary of being exposed to unlimited liability in the event of a Fukushima-type accident involving any of their reactors. The rules, which were notified on November 11, were made public on Wednesday on the eve of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to Bali for a regional...

Till a few years ago, the final arbiter of what is and is not permissible programming was the Union information & broadcasting ministry. In this scrupulous act of discernment, it was aided by the central monitoring services: college students would be appointed as monitors to watch television programmes and listen to radio shows round the clock and report to the ministry. Any channel or radio show that transgressed the programme...

Many people including members of Team Anna have expressed reservations about the way in which their campaign has been developing, and some have even resigned. This raises questions about the real aim of the leadership around Anna. Is it really what it is proclaimed to be? Is the aim to get the Jan Lokpal Bill passed by parliament? Team Anna has repeatedly stated that they have just a one-point agenda: to get...

-The Hindu   I didn't mean to denigrate judiciary, says Jayarajan Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader M.V. Jayarajan, who was found guilty of criminal contempt by the Kerala High Court for criticising the judiciary and sentenced to six months' simple imprisonment and a fine of Rs.2,000, on Saturday challenged the November 8 judgment in the Supreme Court. In his appeal, filed by advocate P.V. Dinesh, Mr. Jayarajan maintained that he never meant to...

As the Right to Information Act (RTI) celebrated the sixth year of its coming, there has been much heated discussion, often emotional, of the benefits that it has brought and also the challenges with which it has confronted government. This debate came to a head with the prime minister’s inaugural address to the Annual Convention of the Central Information Commission on October 14. It is accepted in all circles that the...