-The Hindu Development, price rise and jobs will be the overriding voter concerns in 2014 Lok Sabha poll Results from a nearly 20,000-strong opinion poll conducted by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) for CNN-IBN and The Hindu indicate that ‘development and the economy' and ‘price rise' will dominate voter concerns in 2014. Corruption comes in at a distant fifth, just half as important to voters as ‘development and...

-The Hindu Boards are understaffed, have little time for meetings, inspection or regulation, says study Mumbai: Environmental protection seems to be in shaky hands with political appointees nominated to head state pollution control boards (SPCB) in some places. In one case, the educational qualification of the chairperson was tenth standard. In Karnataka, for instance, the chairperson of the SPCB is Vaman Acharya, a senior BJP leader. In Himachal Pradesh, it is Kuldip Singh...

-The Hindu Building on the work by RTI activists, India needs to set up a mechanism that can make for accountability on the sources and utilisation of party funds Throughout the world, political parties collect funds to build and sustain the organisation, to train party cadres and fight elections. Recognising that they are the main link to the citizens (as voters) and, by implication, the mainstay of democracy, many countries, including India,...

-The Business Standard The mid-day meal scheme cannot be blamed for the Chapra incident. It is a question of professionalising the administration and everyone doing his duty. N C Saxena, Food Commissioner appointed by the Supreme Court in the Right to Food case tells Sreelatha Menon.Edited excerpts: * Can the mid-day meal tragedy in Chapra be blamed on the decision to have separate kitchens for each school without a monitoring mechanism? The monitoring...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Former Chief Election Commissioner N Gopalaswami and eight other eminent citizens Saturday filed a PIL in the Delhi high court challenging appointment of Shashi Kant Sharma as Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG). The petition has been filed afresh as on July 15 an apex court bench headed by Chief Justice Altamas Kabir, who has since retired, refused to hear it saying, "The high court...