Noting poor response of officials to complaints from people belonging to scheduled castes in most districts of Maharashtra, two benches of the national human rights commission (NHRC) heard 571 cases of human rights violations in the state. The ben
In a world where ‘green’ is a good word and ‘going green’ is no longer attracts raised eyebrows, TERI is organising its 13th Delhi Sustainable Development Summit, which was inaugurated by prime minister Manmohan Singh on Th
Making a strong pitch for separate Telangana, NCP Chief Sharad Pawar today told Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that a delay in the matter would not be helpful. The NCP chief today said he raised this issue with Prime Minister, becoming the
The government will come up with a modified Direct Taxes Code (DTC) Bill after incorporating the suggestions of the Standing Committee on Finance, which among things had suggested raising annual income tax exemption limit to Rs 3 lakh. &qu
The amended Lokpal Bill, which delinks the central government from creation of state Lokayuktas, was on Thursday approved by the union cabinet, paving the way for its consideration by Parliament. The revised bill incorporates a number of c
The Kolkata Police’s ‘advisory’ (read ‘warning’) to Salman Rushdie to stay away from the ‘cultural capital of India’ was not based on anticipation of Muslim volatility in Kolkata (or, indeed, any other par
Sawa Ram, a resident of Uplagarh under Abu Road block of Sirohi district, still recalls with chill the day a woman from the neigbouring Mathara fali, or a hamlet, had to be carried on bamboo sticks all the way to the community health centre (CHC)
The Paris-based think tank, Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), has praised India for rolling out its ambitious scheme, direct cash transfer, from January 1, 2013. “The cash transfer scheme is a right idea&h
Everything seems to be going well for the Singh family of Gohaldihi village. The elder son, Sapan, has cracked the police exam and is now undergoing training in Medinipur town. His mother Bharati says the training is for three months after which h
The grand old party has finally woken up to the potential of the social media. Its senior leaders including Kapil Sibal and Digvijay Singh discussed the possibilities of the new media at the party’s chitan shivir in Jaipur this month.
On June 27, 2005, prime minister Manmohan Singh made a seemingly run-of-the-mill observation while addressing the chief ministers at the national development council (NDC) meeting. He said: “If the benefits of growth have to reach all sectio
A 1998 batch officer of West Bengal Civil Service executive, Pranab Ghosh has been the district planning officer (DPLO) of West Medinipur for the last two and half years. Before that, he was the executive magistrate under the personnel and adminis
J Jayalalithaa and Mamata Banerjee are as different as political leaders as appam is from shorshe-ilish (hilsa cooked in mustard). But at heart, the two could well be conjoined twins. Both strong women with an appetite for a fight, both are known
In signs of a thaw, Shiv Sena President Uddhav Thackeray on Wednesday said he would welcome any offer of an alliance between his party and the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) in the interests of the Marathi people. Howev
Days into his new job as the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) national president, Rajnath Singh has his hands full, trying to quell the discomfiture in NDA partner JD(U) following senior party leader Yashwant Sinha’s endorsement of Naren
Some leaders are good speakers, some are bad speakers, and a few are good at messing it up every time they are handed the microphone. There’s a difference between the last two; a difference as yawning as the one between, say, Manmohan Singh
“I sometimes become the inadvertent object of political leaders who choose to make me a symbol of all that they think is wrong and unpatriotic about Muslims in India…. There have been occasions when I have been accused of bearing
The Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed a plea to shift the trial in Delhi gangrape-cum-murder case to a place outside the national capital. A bench headed by Chief Justice Altamas Kabir rejected a transfer petition which was claimed to hav
Pakistan’s Interior Minister Rehman Malik on Tuesday waded into the controversy over Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan’s remarks about the problems purportedly faced by Indian Muslims, saying the Indian government should provide the actor
Shedding its 9-month long hawkish monetary policy stance, the Reserve Bank on Tuesday slashed its key interest rates by 0.25 per cent and released Rs 18,000 crore additional liquidity into the system to perk up growth through reduced cost of borro
