-The Telegraph Ranchi: Faced with an imminent Jharkhand High Court hearing on the progress made at Nagri where three premier educational institutes are coming up, a cornered state government has planned a desperate defence to counter allegations of mishandling the issue and escalating the battle of ownership of 227 acres. According to sources, the government will tell the court of a plan to set up police barracks at the construction sites of...

-The Hindu Most people remain at the mercy of a venal administration that, encouraged by the absence of an independent watchdog, exploits them relentlessly   The state of affairs in the country is characterised by rampant corruption at all levels leading to a breakdown in the rule of law and lack of accountability all around. One can say that there is a complete collapse of governance in the country. Something drastic needs to...

Ranchi: Supreme Court today dismissed a petition filed by local tribals against setting up three national institutes of higher learning on the outskirts of Ranchi, arming a hitherto defensive district administration to deal with the ongoing protests firmly. According to lawyer Rajeev Gupta, representing petitioners Mangu Oraon and others, an apex court division bench comprising Justice H.L. Gokhale and Justice Ranjana Desai observed that “it’s a 50-year old case” which the...

-The Telegraph Governor M.K. Narayanan today said he was given “legal advice” that the Singur bill did not require presidential assent — an observation the government has seized upon in its search for a scapegoat. Absence of presidential assent was one of the key reasons cited by a Calcutta High Court division bench last week to strike down the Singur law. The state government today spoke of looking at “other alternatives” alongside...

-Tehelka Justice Sujata Manohar on how the Biotechnology Bill is fundamentally flawed IN THE last few years, regulatory systems across the board have been undergoing an overhaul to fit the needs of a new era. Likewise, new laws are being chalked out to meet new needs, and several are receiving flak owing to the loopholes and regressive grounds on which these have been drafted. The relatively more recent one to regulate modern...