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Gujjars are back!

The Gujjars of Rajasthan are back in action. Their long march to lay a siege of Jaipur has begun. Another few days and the Rajasthan capital could well be cut off from all sides as the Gujjars are moving in from east, west and south in large numbers. This time, their demand is to “implement” what their earlier agitations had led to—5 percent reservation in educational institut

Terrorists eye N-bomb

A Harvard University study claims that terrorist groups like – Al-Qaida, Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) pursuing nuclear weapons. The report further mentions that nuclear programme in not as safe as the government of Pakistan says. “The greatest risks are in Pakistan, whose small and heavily guarded stockpile confronts immense threats from both insiders theft and outsider attack,&rdq

EVMs might be endangering democracy

As the debate over the susceptibility of electronic voting machines (EVMs) to electoral fraud heats up, India is looking at the experience of other countries. Till Jaeger, a German attorney, who visited India in February, believes that the use of EVMs is a violation of citizens’ fundamental right to information in a democracy. In an interview to Governance Now, Jaeger, who argued a landma

Dumb charade

For the past one decade, the focus of India`s engagement with the United states has always been on de-hyphenation of Pakistan. If the complex diplomatic jargon is to be simplified, we are made to understand that the United States accord us greater status in the comity of nations. And there have been ample instances when Indian political leadership has shown its grit in standing up to pressures

FAO: Livestock sector needs investments

As the world faces multiple challenges, the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) report has said that urgent investments, agricultural research and robust governance are needed to overcome growing hunger threat. The report says that the livestock sector is one of the fastest growing parts of the agricultural economy. For many small-scale farmers, livestock also provides an important

Resigned to the resignation game

I  am so impressed with P Chidambaram. Not only has he trotted down to the site of the CRPF massacre but he even took the salute with his hand squashed across his forehead at the CRPF parade and stood near the bodies of the dead and cheered up the wounded and then showed the gravel in his gut by resigning because the buck stopped at his desk. The buck, he said, stops here. The buck, he roa

How to deal with the Maoists

Going by the surfeit of articles in the newspapers and magazines, debates in television studios or in various forums outside it seems the Maoist issue is far too complicated. Quite apparently, there is lack of clarity and consensus-- among politicians, governments, civil society groups and consequently, among ordinary people—over several fundamental aspects of the issue. Using this lack o

India`s cyber-security faces Chinese threats?

Chinese hackers have reportedly broken into websites hosting secret documents of India defence ministry and Indian embassies around the world, says a report by the Munk School of Global Affairs of the University of Toronto. The report titled ‘Shadows in the Cloud’ also says that among the systems leaked out could be ‘Shakti’, of the Indian Army and the country&rs

Rajya Sabha is now a crorepatis` club

The members of Upper House of the Parliament are growing richer. More than 50 percent of the Rajya Sabha members are crorepatis, says a report released on Tuesday by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR). “A total of 98 Rajya Sabha MPs out of analyzed 183 Rajya Sabha MPs, or 54 per cent, are crorepatis,” says the report. The report also found out that amongst

More than a simple mess

Not since they went looking for Private Ryan or, more somberly, the Rwanda massacres have so many armed and trained soldiers been ambushed and killed in one fell swoop as did happen in India on bloodsoaked Tuesday. The massacre of as many as 90 soldiers and counting not to even calculate the number of the wounded was a disaster of the most monumental proportions. When a trained force goes into

Naxals and terrorists - kindreds of discord?

When does a local insurgency acquire stripes of a full-blown revolution? When the arc of discontent widens itself and acquires more geography enveloping more people, all equally discontented, and thus turns itself into a circle of fire that is searing enough to burn the system down. That’s all? No. It certainly has to have a strong ideological fibre that would fuel the popular discontent

e-Waste mountains could crush India`s environment

India along with other developing countries will face the spectre of hazardous e-waste mountains with serious consequences for the environment and public health if recycling of e-waste is left to the vagaries of the informal sector, says a UN Environment Programme (UNEP) report. Some of the key findings of the report: * The report points out that by 2020 in India e-waste from ol

`Lack of training led to Dantewada slaughter`

How could the Maoists butcher 75 CRPF personnel in Dantewada so easily? "They had no training." That was the crisp response from Brigadier B K Ponwar. He should know. For several years, Ponwar has been training the police and paramilitary forces to take on the Maoists at the Counter Terrorism and Jungle Warfare College of Kanker in Chhattisgarh. "And

Honouring Mother India

This is the story of two women. This is the story of India in transition. This is the story of Chandrapati. This is the story of Vani Gopal Sharma. The former is a 55-year-old widow from a Haryana village who steadfastly took on the dreaded system of ‘khap panchayat,’ in her fight for justice against the brutal killing of her son by his in-laws. The latter a judge who did not blink

South leads the way in e-readiness: NCAER

Tamil Nadu, AP, Karnataka along with Delhi and Chandigarh named leaders in NCAER report. Karnataka, Chandigarh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Delhi, AP have been ranked as leaders in e-readiness assessment as per the India e-Readiness Assessment Report 2008 released last month by the Department of Information Technology, government of India. The report published by department in coll

Afghanistan tops in hashish production: UN

Afghanistan is world’s biggest producer of hashish, says a 2010 report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. The latest survey adds to the world’s concern on the war torn Afghanistan’s drug cultivation. Afghanistan is already world’s top opium producer. Now, according to the report, the country produces more hasish than opium. The report points out tha

The promise of All Fools Day

April Fool’s should be the last day to heed promises, especially for the Aam Aadmi who has seen enough of tokenism while suffering chronically bad governance. It’s impossible, however, not to be tempted by the many promises of today. It’s the day when the Right to Education Act comes into force and what is billed as the ‘largest ever census in human histo

Sonia`s NAC agenda

The Congress seems to have developed into a fine art the difficult practice of running two power centres. Ever since the party came back to power in 2004, there was hardly any doubt that Sonia Gandhi is the political boss but there came a time, especially during the nuclear deal and the first few months of UPA2 when it seemed like Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had a mind of his own, too.

Postcards from the Republic of Hunger

Starvation deaths and Orissa have become synonymous. It does not raise eyebrows anymore. Nobody loses sleep over them, least of all the local administration. A series of reports has appeared in a national daily pointing out that about 50 people have perished to hunger in Balangir (one of the three districts infamous as KBK, along with Korapur and Kalahandi) alone in the past two to three years.

Rural India’s housing woes

Coming down heavily on the housing finance companies which have played a key role in housing for urban India, a report prepared by the National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) says that these companies have done nothing for the rural India. There is a collapse of government’s social housing development programme - Indira Awas Yojana (IAY), the report says. The key finding is that

Visionary Talk: Amitabh Gupta, Pune Police Commissioner with Kailashnath Adhikari, MD, Governance Now


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