-IANS   Breaking the stereotypes associated with madrassas, a 50-year-old Islamic seminary here teaches subjects like personality development and home science, runs an elaborate teacher training programme, has a higher girl enrolment ratio and has students who are no less active on social networking websites than their counterparts in the metros. Welcome to Jamiatul Falah, a madrassa in Bilariyaganj town of Uttar Pradesh's Azamgarh's district that has kept pace with modern education. The...

-PTI The Supreme Court today issued notice to the Chhattisgarh High Court registry on a PIL alleging manipulation and irregularities in the conduct of a civil judges examination in 2008 to favour candidates related to CERTain judges, bureaucrats and politicians. A bench of Justices R.M. Lodha and H.L. Gokhale issued the directive after counsel Prashant Bhushan, appearing for Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL), submitted that no action had been taken on...

-EPW Graft is a major issue in people’s lives, but it is unlikely to figure in voter choice in the assembly elections. A mini-general election will be upon us in February as fivestates go to the polls. Given the high-pitched outpouringson the electronic media around the anti-corruption campaign and the live coverage of the proceedings in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha on the Lokpal Bill, we have been led to...

The Union government has tabled two bills in the Lok Sabha in the last week of the winter session. Since one of them is the lok pal bill, it has hijacked virtually all the public attention. This is a pity for two reasons. First, there is considerable doubt whether the lok pal bill — in any form — can really be the magic solution that Team Anna would like us...

The year 2011 saw the highest number of cases disposed of in recent years, with more than 79,000 cases cleared under the leadership of Chief Justice of India S.H. Kapadia. In his Law Day address, Justice Kapadia rejected the allegation made in CERTain quarters about the huge pendency of cases and said: “There is a backlog of cases. However, it is not as big as is sought to be projected.” Seventy-four...