Raising questions of credibility and independence, the state police today did not seek custody of the four Trinamool Congress supporters named in the FIR for the murders of a former CPM MLA and a CPM district committee member. This despite the fact that they were booked under Sections 302 and 304 of IPC. The judge had to grant “judicial custody” to the four accused. Senior police officials said that the norm...

At a time when the Congress-led UPA government has been battling with Team Anna over a comprehensive anti-corruption legislation, the Central Information Commission (CIC) has taken on the government and the judiciary over the transparency issue saying not even a single public authority has been following disclosure norms.  Even six years after the implementation of the Right to Information Act 2005, the final appellate authority for the legislation feels that the...

While welcoming the report of the High Level Expert Group on Universal Health Coverage for India for its comprehensive vision and many well-conceived recommendations, this article focuses on the conditions needed for its promise to bear fruit. Towards this, it explores the political dimension, which comprises the forces and interests that come into play to shape and reconfigure administrative policy and its implementation.   We are grateful to Anand Zachariah and Susie...

-The Business Standard   A Nandan Nilekani-led task force on an Aadhaar-enabled unified payment infrastructure has recommended setting up a network of one million interoperable micro-ATMs across the country. The ATMs will be operated by business correspondents. The task force, headed by the Chairman of Unique Identification Authority of India, submitted its report to Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Thursday. The panel has suggested that in order to set-up this network quickly, a last-mile transaction...

‘Use of locally available food can go a long way in keeping children healthy' Going local on food consumption is the way to keep children healthy. This simple truth – based as much on traditional wisdom as it is on scientific principle – is the message of the committee set up to address child malnutrition in Karnataka, which has prescribed a “feeding protocol” for children of different age groups, pregnant women...