What kept Prime Minister Manmohan Singh busy after securing minister A Raja’s resignation on the night of November 14 last year?   He was writing a reply to National Advisory Council chairperson Sonia Gandhi’s letter on the practice of manual scavenging. On November 15, he wrote to her that he was asking the Minister of Social Justice & Empowerment to “examine how to strengthen” implementation of the Employment of Manual Scavengers and...

-PTI   The trustworthiness of the administration among tribal population is “very low” due to unresolved land issues that have led to escalation in Maoist menace, Union Minister of Rural Development Jairam Ramesh said here on Saturday. Issues such as forcible eviction of people for land acquisition for projects, unsettled rehabilitation packages, degradation and unproductivity of land given to the poor have aggravated the Maoists’ menace in the Central and Eastern parts of...

The National Mission to improve the delivery of justice is at work. In October 2009, on the basis of a Vision Document adopted at a judicial conference in New Delhi, the Government of India approved in principle a National Mission to reduce pendency and delays in the judicial system and enhance accountability through structural changes, higher performance standards and capacity-building. Many past attempts to achieve the goals did not yield results...

-The Times of India   With the Bombay high court making it clear that it would grant no further extension to the ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) for passing the final order on Lavasa, Ajit Gulabchand, chief of Hindustan Construction Company (HCC), now hopes of a green clearance. "We hope the MoEF will issue the order giving environment clearance by November 10," Gulabchand said on Tuesday. The additional solicitor general had informed the...

-The Telegraph   The Maharashtra government said it would take “credible action” against the Lavasa township project after Bombay High Court today told it to “make its stand clear”. The state government has said it will take action in two weeks. Building work was stopped in November last year when the Union environment ministry showcaused Lavasa Corporation for starting construction without its clearance. On June 10 this year, the ministry imposed five conditions that...