The National Institute for Smart Government (NISG) was established in May, 2002 with a vision to establish itself as a centre of excellence by leveraging private sector resources through the public-private partnership mode for the spread of e-governance. The national taskforce on IT and software development set up in 1998 first came up with the idea of establishing an institute in coll
Let`s face the odorous truth. India is not going to meet its Millennium Development Goals (MDG) of turning `open defecation free` (ODF) by 2015. Not by 2020 and not even years beyond. And this is not "vested ramblings" from donor agencies like the World Bank, UNICEF or Water Aid, that have been critical of the rural development ministry administered subsidy-driven total sanita
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is in an unenviable position. He has spent seven years safe in the knowledge that everybody knows he is not his own man. He has remained largely a spectator as his party president has run a super cabinet of sorts and many of his cabinet colleagues their independent fiefdoms. His first term was remarkable for his singular assertion on the India-US civil nucl
A high-level political commitment is an imperative for pushing forward the e-governance drive in the country. ICT projects in the country are as old as two to three decades. However, successive governments have paid mere lip service to creating a conducive ICT ecology in the country. The developed countries, which invested in ICT and other emerging technologies much before the others in
The Constituent Assembly and late Dr BR Ambedkar worked tirelessly to give shape to the Indian constitution promising us liberty, equality, rule of law and peaceful existence. The constitution was made to be a self-contained document setting out the fundamental rights, the directive principles of state policy, the constitutional plan for the separation of powers amongst different organs of gove
The Maharajah who could once become a lover boy in Paris, a sumo wrestler in Tokyo, a pavement artist, a Red Indian, a monk... who could effortlessly flirt with the beauties of the world (as quoted on the Air India website) is now gasping for breath. The late J R D Tata, the man behind the national carrier, could have never imagined that a day would come when the employees of his
Just when the attention of newsmen across the nation was fixed on the Lokpal issue, the government excluded the central bureau of investigation (CBI) from the purview of the right to information (RTI) act. And how did you and I come to know about it? The agency, responding to the RTI query filed by Subhash Chandra Agrawal told him that as per a June 9 notification, it had been in
The first ever cumulative impact assessment (CIA) study of hydro-power projects being built on Bhagirathi and Alaknanda, two tributaries of river Ganga, has come as a big disappointment. Carried out by the Alternate Hydro Energy Centre (AHEC) of IIT (Roorkee), which submitted its report to the ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) recently, the study ignores the very r
Visit any hospital in Delhi and you will find a display board carrying the message that sex selection test is prohibited. Still, the number of girl children is diminishing in India. Many analysts believe that the practice of aborting the girl child has taken such deep roots that there may be no escape from it. But when it becomes a global phenomenon, what would you call it? Mary Anne Warren coi
Secrecy is intrinsic to statecraft. Yet, it induces a certain degree of paranoia among even the consummate practitioners of statecraft. That is why union finance minister Pranab Mukherjee lost his cool when he was told that his office was bugged. So furious was the finance minister that he even dispatched a missive to prime minister Manmohan Singh and asked for a “secret probe”
Romeo and Juliet may not have been a tragic play had both of them been class 12 pass outs aspiring to take admission in Delhi University this year. So what if Juliet studied all year round to make it to the first list of Shri Ram College of Commerce (SRCC) but couldn’t through because of having a science background. And so what if Romeo did not study all year round because he was
Secrecy is intrinsic to statecraft. Yet, it induces a certain degree of paranoia among even the consummate practitioners of statecraft. That is why union finance minister Pranab Mukherjee lost his cool when he was told that his office was bugged. So furious was the finance minister that he even dispatched a missive to prime minister Manmohan Singh and asked for a “secret probe”.
The ministry of corporate affairs has finally mandated that a set of companies will file balance sheets, profit and loss account, the director’s and auditor’s report for the year 2010-11 onwards by using eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) taxonomy. This language is used for the electronic communication of business and financial data and facilitates preparation, analysis a
The latest report on the Mangalore air crash regarding the suspicion that Air India might have “tampered” with the pilots’ flight roster and forced Capt Zlatko Glusica to fly despite fatigue has revived concerns over fatigued pilots. Even a year after the Mangalore air crash last year killed 158 people, a lot remains to be done to mitigate pilot fatigue. The Flight and
The spate of scams that hit the body politic during the last few months and the startling public disclosures from the Radia tapes had already made discussions on corruption the most favourite national pastime. Now, Anna Hazare’s fast, the constitution of the Lokpal bill drafting committee and the surge of popular support have firmly focused the spotlight on the issue of corruption. Howeve
The National Green Tribunal (NGT) came into existence a year ago, but did not become functional till recently due to challenges to the NGT Act, 2010. The tribunal was set up to enable affected parties to appeal against any infringement of environmental laws and to entertain cases of civil liability pertaining to environmental laws in India. The predecessor to the NGT, the erstwhile Nation
The paranoia about cut-offs, though understandable, is also comic. It is simplistic to see the ‘cut-off jolt’ as a bolt from the blue. It has been in the offing for quite some time. We had enough time to initiate preventive measures. We did nothing. This may sound surprising but is true, nonetheless, that conducting admissions is not any less traumatic than securing them. Ye
The government has made a strong case that only the elected representatives have a right to frame laws. A spokesman of the Congress party has even labelled a section of civil society "unelected tyrant". But the government`s own devices of inviting public participation leave much to be desired. The Department of Information (DIT) under Kapil Sibal recently invited feedback on t
My dear wife stops reading my column the moment I refer to St Stephen’s, my alma mater. So, let me try begining with Hindu College, the perfectly eminent institution across the road. Kavita A Sharma applied to Hindu College straight into second year. She wanted an exit from medicine and the then principal agreed to admit her. The initial results weren’t very encouragi
Swami Nigamanand is dead. The 36-year-old swami died in Haridwar after fasting for 114 days to protest illegal mining along the Ganga. Union environment minister Jairam Ramesh said in New Delhi a day later that the matter was the Uttarakhand government’s responsibility. The BJP-ruled state government will surely pass off something equally unpalatable for an explanation or blame the centre
