On December 23, 2011, in a criminal case filed by Vinay Rai, editor of a Delhi-based Urdu daily called Akbari , the Metropolitan Magistrate, Patiala House, directed the Ministry of External Affairs to have summons served on over 21 websites based abroad on the grounds that offences of sale of obscene books and obscene objects to young persons and criminal conspiracy could be made out against these sites under sections...

How economically sustainable is food subsidy? The cost could even be double of what the government estimates Food deprivation and malnutrition are completely unacceptable and everything has to be done to eliminate such an evil. The prevalence of malnutrition in a country like India is in itself a cause for serious concern since malnourished children may jeopardise India’s favourable demographic dividend (as per independent estimates, close to 60 per cent of...

-Rediff.com    The last six to seven years of the Nitish Kumar government in Bihar has not seen any significant increase in Maoist violence, which nevertheless continues to take a toll of lives and government property. According to figures compiled by the state police headquarters, in 2008, the Maoists destroyed three government buildings, blasted railway tracks at six places, besides two private buildings, torched five JCB machines used in road construction and 12...

-The Times of India   Petitions seeking the inclusion of Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and National Investigation Agency (NIA) under the Right to Information Act, have to be transferred to theSupreme Court to be heard along with other petitions raising similar demands, CBI told the high court on Wednesday.  When the case came up for hearing before actingChief Justice Manjula Chellur and Justice PR Ramachandra Menon, CBI's counsel submitted to the court...

Holding that “ideology should control the gun and not vice versa,” Odisha Organising Committee secretary of the Communist Party of India (Maoist) Sabyasachi Panda admitted that many of the outfit's cadres were becoming trigger-happy due to an inadequate understanding of revolutionary movement and society. “Ideology should control the gun, not vice versa. Many of our cadres, who are armed, do not know about principles. As a result, they resort to...