-Down to Earth The amendment to the RTI Act does not deserve the assent of the President, writes former Central Information Commissioner M Sridhar Acharyulu in the second of this two-part series The Union Minister of State for Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions told the House that Parliament's competence to enact a law to give effect to the citizens' right to obtain information is located in Entry 97 of the Union List...

-The Indian Express Helping farmers produce solar energy can help realise the government’s target of doubling farmers’ incomes. In July, two interesting things happened that can help Indian farmers to a large extent in augmenting their incomes. First, the Union Finance Minister (FM) in her maiden budget speech asked why the annadata (farmer) cannot become the urjadata (producer of solar power). Second, in Parliament, the agriculture minister for state, responding to...

-The Hindu A large number of caste names are difficult to tabulate, says official. New Delhi: Census 2021 is unlikely to collect “caste wise” data as a similar exercise conducted in 2011 by another ministry threw up about 40 lakh caste names that were difficult to tabulate, a senior government official said on Friday. The decennial exercise would involve 31 lakh trained enumerators, with data collected digitally using Android based mobile phones. The Census...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Census 2021 will for the first time seek information from households on smartphones, DTH/Cable TV connection, internet access, number of members of households having bank accounts, ownership of house other than the rented accommodation of a household, bottled water availability and mobile number as part of the houselisting procedure. Importantly, the latest census, as per the existing plan, will not collect caste data. While the socio-economic...

-The Hindu Heated debate in Assembly as data suggests many in districts dominated by indigenous people have been left out The Assam government on Thursday pushed for re-verification of the applications for the National Register of Citizens (NRC) after district-wise data presented in the Assembly suggested most people in areas bordering Bangladesh have been included in the citizenship list, while many in districts dominated by the indigenous people have been left out. This...