-The Business Standard   The latest controversy in the British media, triggered by unethical professional practices by journalists at Rupert Murdoch’s News of the World, holds important lessons for the Indian media, and not just because Mr Murdoch has a significant presence in India and seeks more. The most important lesson is that public policy must prevent the emergence of all powerful media moguls like Mr Murdoch. The extent of concentration in...

Farmers are caught between Mayawati’s promises, Rahul Gandhi’s idealism and mounting debts Land acquisition policy in Uttar Pradesh has been changed at least five times in the past five years to benefit the farmers. Amidst the raging controversies over what should be the land compensation rate and debates and protests over the various clauses of the land acquisition policy, most farmers have lost more than they could gain from Mayawati’s new...

-Orissa Diary   More than 20 tribals belonging to primitive Dangaria Kandh community from Niyamgiri area Thursday joined the anti Posco movement to express their solidarity to the ongoing  ovement at Posco proposed site. The tribals, armed with traditional weapons, came in a procession to the protest site near Govindpur village and joined the villagers. The villagers have formed a human barricade to prevent entry of government and company officials to the proposed...

Casual work, self-employment still rule Q&A Why are fewer women working? Education schemes and higher wages of men are keeping them home for longer. Why is casual work growing? The biggest employment scheme, NREGA, employs casual workers. Why is self-employment down? The least-paying jobs in the self-employment sector are worse than NREGA entitlements. *** The latest official figures on employment say this: a typical Indian worker is male, starts working in his mid-20s, is presumably better educated than...

The Supreme Court order against the Salwa Judum’s vigilantism in Chhattisgarh must be read by all, especially government officials. The details of the civil war in the tribal districts of Chhattisgarh are largely unknown to most readers of this newspaper. For the region is remote and inaccessible, and easily ignored by the national media.   This civil war pits, on the one side, Maoist extremists, and, on the other, a band of...