-The Hindu India is a republic only when its laws result from free public discussion and pass open scrutiny The Preamble to the Constitution declares that India is a ‘Republic’. This self-description must be taken seriously: being a republic is integral to India’s political identity. Moreover, this is not just a descriptive but also a strong, ethical, normative claim. Being republican is an ideal to which we are meant to consistently aspire,...

-The Indian Express Political instability is new to this relatively young state, where Chamling served as Chief Minister for 25 years starting 1994. New Delhi: Last week, Sikkim’s longest serving Chief Minister, Pawan Chamling, became the sole elected Opposition representative in the Assembly after the remaining 12 Sikkim Democratic Front (SDF) MLAs defected, with 10 joining the BJP and another two joining the ruling Sikkim Krantikari Morcha (SKM). Political instability is...

-Newsclick.in NYAY amounts to a largesse by the government, an act of charity towards the bottom quintile, not the institution of a universal economic right to decent living. My attitude to the NYAY scheme of the Congress is similar to my attitude to a benevolent Monarchy. While a benevolent Monarchy is better than a tyrannical one, any Monarchy is repugnant compared to a republic. Likewise compared to the current neo-liberal regime any...

-The New York Times   It started five years ago after a young engineer in San Francisco sketched out a quirky little Web tool for telling your friends what you were up to. It became a bullhorn for millions of people worldwide, especially vital in nations that tend to muzzle their own people. But this week, in a sort of coming-of-age moment, Twitter announced that upon request, it would block certain messages...

India is one of only four countries which, during the first half of 2011, requested Google to remove content on the basis that it was critical of the government. Google refused to comply. The other countries were Thailand and Turkey -- where Google restricted local users from accessing the offending content -- and the United States, where it refused. According to Google's Transparency Report for January to June 2011, the Internet...