With Adarsh Society's lawyers pleading before the Bombay High Court that the scam-hit society too deserved consideration for post-facto environmental clearance similar to that to be granted to the Lavasa hill city in Pune, the warning of Activists and environmentalists that regularising Lavasa would set a disastrous precedent seems to be coming true. Advocate Mukul Rohatgi stated on Monday that Adarsh and Lavasa cases should be considered on the same grounds....

The Orissa government suspends the land acquisition for the Posco project in the face of stiff opposition from the people. SIX years ago, when the South Korean steel giant Posco arrived in Orissa with the biggest ever foreign direct investment that had come the country's way, it was expected to help rid the economically backward State of its ‘poor' tag and bring prosperity. Posco had won the $12 billion deal at...

-The Indian Express   A study sponsored by the Union Home Ministry has recommended that Naxal sympathisers should be "left alone" to the confinement of seminar halls rather than persecuting them. "Distinction needs to be made between Naxal Activists and the cheerleaders, between incitement and advocacy and between criminal conspiracies and ideological sympathises. While the state can go all out against the Naxal overground Activists, alleged persecution of the cheerleaders would provide...

-The Hindustan Times   A month after the Centre approved CBI’s request to exempt it from the purview of the Right to Information Act, the Delhi High Court is set to examine its validity. Sitab Ali Chaudhary, a lawyer, has filed a PIL, making the Centre, the home and law ministries, CBI and National Investigating Agency answerable to the petition. A bench headed by chief justice Dipak Misra will hear the PIL on...

-The Deccan Herald   "CBI can’t be equated with other agencies." The Union cabinet’s recent decision to exclude the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) from the purview of the Right to Information (RTI) Act is wrong and, as widely suspected, ill-motivated. The CBI has been trying to secure such an exemption for long for wrong reasons. The cabinet has acted according to the wishes of the investigative agency and notified its decision. The...