-The Hindu The Punjab and Haryana High Court has taken suo motu cognizance of the alleged crime reported by a newspaper; no eyewitness or victims produced yet A high-level probe has been ordered into allegations of at least 10 women being raped by members of a mob in Murthal village in Haryana during the recent quota agitation by the Jat community. Apart from top police officers from the State and members of the...

-The Hindu Censorship by hardline Hindu groups has grown, says Amnesty Criticising the government for using archaic laws to suppress dissent, Amnesty International, in its report for 2015-16, has included India among countries that have failed to match up to the “international standard” of freedom of expression and civil liberties. The report especially noted that over the past year, crackdown on freedom of expression by majoritarian groups linked to the government had intensified,...

-Frontline Former psephologist Yogendra Yadav, now a member of the political collective Swaraj Abhiyan, recently toured India’s drought-affected districts. He called it a Samvedna Yatra. During the tour, he took note of the agony in rural areas affected by what he calls “one of the worst droughts in independent India” The drought, according to him, has left farmers and the larger rural community in extreme distress, leading to damaging changes in...

-The Indian Express If the government does not have the will to regulate 55,000 pre-natal diagnostic clinics, how will it track 29 million pregnancies annually? I was inspired by Maneka Gandhi’s struggle to get back her passport (impounded by the Janata Party government) as an IIT student in 1977. Her Supreme Court case led to a landmark judgment on personal liberty. Subsequently Gandhi filed petitions in courts to protect animal rights....

-The Indian Express Among other crimes, robbery and cheating with 22 cases each are among the most common. New Delhi: Sexual offences form 13 per cent, or roughly one-eighth, of the crimes committed against foreigners in India while thefts are four times higher, government data reveal. The latest case of sexual offence being probed is the alleged stripping and assault of a Tanzanian student in Bengaluru. Last year, National crime Records Bureau...