Former chief minister of Bihar Lalu Prasad Yadav on Tuesday claimed that all the allegations leveled against him in the Rs 900-crore fodder scam were biased and the CBI (Central Bureau of Investigation) had acted against him under political pressure to ruin his career.  Lalu was replying to questions of special CBI judge PK Singh in the fodder scam case (RC 20/96) related to fraudulent withdrawal of more than Rs 37...

The recommendations of the Planning Commission’s High Level Expert Group on Access to Universal Healthcare are significant because they make explicit the need to contextualise health within the rights. However, the problem with the report is that it does not ask why many of the same recommendations that were made by previous committees have not been implemented. The HLEG neither recognises the problems, constraints and compulsions at the national, state...

The EC strikes out at paid news, but what it has seen is just the tip of the iceberg It’s getting bigger by the day. If the sheer number of notices sent by the Election Commission to candidates and media houses is any indication, paid news is big news in the assembly elections in Punjab. By the time polling came to a close on January 30, the commission’s media monitoring committees...

“It never reached anywhere except in the pockets of the officers, contractors” “Bundelkhand package? It never reached anywhere except in the pockets of the officers and contractors.” This is the standard reply one gets on queries over the ambitious Rs. 7,266 crore special package announced by the Planning Commission for this backward drought-prone region of Uttar Pradesh. Announced in 2009, the package was meant for the overall development of the region spread...

Dispelling the general perception that the CPI(Maoist), the left wing extremist outfit, is opposed to all industrial projects, Odisha-based top red leader Sabyasachi Panda said going all out against industries would shatter the livelihood of labourers. The secretary of the Odisha organising committee of CPI(Maoist) clarified this while speaking to a select group of journalists at an undisclosed location in Kandhamal district, about 250 km from here, on Thursday evening. “Communism always...