The approval by Sri Lanka’s parliament last month of the 19th constitutional amendment represents a historic landmark in that country’s governance. Its implications stretch well beyond Sri Lanka and deserve the attention of governance reformers in India and elsewhere. The amendment is part of a broad programme of reforms launched by president Maithrapala Sirisena, who was a surprise
Forming an opinion about someone comes easy. In fact, it’s second nature. Forming an opinion on their life or death doesn`t appear to be too difficult either. Even if we`ve never met them. On Monday morning as news came in from Mumbai`s King Edward Memorial hospital that Aruna Shanbaug was no more, India was caught up in the euthanasia debate, hastily opining on an issue ne
May Day is an occasion to take stock of the situation as far as workers are concerned. The day refers to the struggle in 1886 in Chicago, where the demand was of eight hours of work, eight hours of rest and eight hours of recreation. The essence of the whole demand was that there should be a limit to the exploitation of workers. Before mechanisation, it used to be a dawn-to-dusk affair for work
The RTI Act has caught the imagination of people and the way it has spread is appreciated and admired around the world. A great change has come in India in the last decade in the power equation between the sovereign citizens and those in power. This change is just beginning and if we can sustain and strengthen it, our defective elective democracy can metamorphose into a truly participatory demo
The heart of the net neutrality debate in India is centred on three fundamental questions. First, is internet a public good? In theory, at least, it is. The Narendra Modi government seems to think so too. The entire plan for the ambitious Digital India initiative is built on the premise of providing all Indians access to internet, the underlying principle of any definition of public good. Secon
April 14, 2016 will be the 125th birth anniversary of Dr BR Ambedkar, and the nation is paying tributes. Most political parties are trying to appropriate the iconic leader’s legacy with an eye on dalit votes. There is no difference between the left and the right in this regard. The BJP organised a rally in Patna on April 14 to launch its election campaign in Bihar. The Con
A latest report released by property consultant Cushman and Wakefield revealed five factors like power, infrastructure, funds, technology and social capital to be inculcated in the 100 smart cities initiatives. India is embracing this push for smart cities after the NDA government came to power last year. By most estimates the level of urbanisation will reach 50 percent in India by 2039. But ev
In his Madison Square Speech in September 2014, our prime minister had reminded the world about India’s advantage of demographic dividend. This has become an important data point to show the world that Indian population is not a problem now. World is of course looking towards us from the perspective of huge demand/investment potential but every other Indian statesman is still hyping on yo
Exactly a month ago as the rains thundered down and caught us unawares, a farmer quietly walked to the middle of his field and hung himself from a tree. Nobody knows Sandeep Shinde. But for a handful of reports, his suicide was no news. Few have heard that this farmer from Beed was running a debt of over a lakh rupees and clutching onto his jowar crop as the only seed of hope. It
Much debate as taken place on the way forward of ‘Net Neutrality’ in India following the issue of the consultation paper by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) for inviting stakeholder feedback which comes to a close this week. The need of the hour is to address all stake-holder concerns. This discussion paper tries to deal with some of the key issues relevant for the w
After stalling and procrastinating for countless times in the last five years the Brihanmumbai municipal corporation (BMC) finally unveiled in February its development plan, or DP, that it confidently claimed will hold the financial capital in good stead at least till 2034. Following widespread criticism,
Network neutrality is all about keeping the internet free and open from the clutches of telecom operators/carriers. The government is expected to finalise a policy on net neutrality in a month’s time. When it actually does, it must keep in mind a few things to protect cons
When the Bamian Buddhas came crashing down like an avalanche, the first person I called was my maternal grandfather. On deputation to the Kabul press in the 1960s, he was lucky to have seen the imposing sixth century monolithic statues that stood guard on the edge of the Bamian valley. He often told us gripping stories of his time in Afghanistan and through his eyes we saw a once flourishing ci
It is one of the most unforgivable incidents, yet it is one in many. This week a child fell to her death in a sump at school because she had to go to fetch water. The government primary school that Susanna studied in is not in the rural interiors of India, but in a bustling, modern city – India`s IT capital Bengaluru. Yet it doesn`t even a have tap for children, let alone purified drinkin
The week ending March 5 acquired significance indicating the direction we, as a country, seem to be heading in. In the preceding five days, there was a ban a day in the country, including the one on beef in Maharashtra and on the screening of the BBC documentary, India’s Daughter. The documentary is detrimental to the nation’s reputation abroad – the nation was told by one of
In one of the biggest auctions of mobile spectrum the government has fetched a whopping sum of `94,000 crore at the end of the fifth day of the sale process, on March 9. Industry watchers say that if the robust bidding continues the government may touch the `1 lakh crore figure. This is certainly good news for the health of the exchequer. And the telecom industry can pat itself on the back for
In a landmark judgment, the Supreme Court of India struck down Section 66A of the Information Technology Act as being unconstitutional and violative of Articles 19(1)(a) and 19(2) of the Constitution of India. The now defunct Section.66A of the IT Act, read as follows: “Punishment for sending offensive messages through communication service, etc.66A. Any pers
In itself a piece of data is discrete and inert. So a number remains just that, an isolated strand. But string numbers together and it has enough potential to become intelligent, almost like the way potential energy turns into explosive kinetic energy. Inert data suddenly transforms into information the moment you give it a context. Give it a perspective and it becomes knowledge. There ar
Giving concrete shape to finance minister Arun Jaitley`s announcement of a bill to trace black money, the union cabinet has just approved a law to track unaccounted wealth by strengthening of the prosecution mechanism and enhancing exchange of information, also including in its ambit stringent provisions for prosecution of offences. The Undisclosed Foreign Income and Assets (Imp
The Delhi Master Plan 2021 has now become meaningless. The spate of recent notifications changing regulations relating to setbacks, ground coverage, FAR, height controls, etc, have resulted in fragmented and unrelated development across the city. Most of these changes have been made to meet the steadily increasing pressure for more intensive development, without a holistic review of their urban
