Feature Article

Jantar Mantar showed up the limitations of a popular movement that lacks a political perspective. (Editorial)

The pace at which India’s population is growing is slowing, but not as rapidly as expected; India will become the largest country in the world sooner than earlier forecast. Literacy rates have increased sharply between 2001 and 2011; some of the low performing rates have shown strong improvements, the others have not.

Anna Hazare’s hunger fast last week for probity in politics captured the news agenda and unleashed a nationwide frenzy. Declarations of victory may be premature since the real work of drafting a law on the Lokpal is only just beginning. Corruption is not an abstract evil that can be combated by the virtuous few.

Many political leaders and intellectuals have criticised the Anna Hazare campaign on the Lokpal Bill for being anti-democratic and anti-political.

Designing and running nuclear power requires an entirely different mode of planning and assessment than possible with conventional risk analysis. There is little indication that the existing organisational culture of the Department of Atomic Energy permits such “over-the-horizon” creative thinking as is required.

Research universities are complex institutions with multiple academic and societal roles. They are both national institutions that contribute to culture, technology and society, and international institutions that link to global intellectual and scientific trends.

Reetika Khera in "The UID Project and Welfare Schemes" has opened a new debate on the promise of the project of providing each Indian citizen a unique identification (UID) card. Specifically she takes issue with the claim that the UID will facilitate the implementation of welfare schemes.

Carbon dioxide has pillaged the Great Barrier Reef of a compound that corals and many sea creatures need to grow. The finding, from the first survey of ocean acidification around one of the world's greatest natural landmarks, supports fears that the ecosystem is on its last legs.

30 villages in Andhra Pradesh are up against a coal-based thermal power plant being built by East Coast Energy Pvt Ltd on Kakarapalli swamp. The contested site is a marshy land with at least 40 middle-sized ponds and a vast area used as salt farms. About 30,000 people depend on it for survival.

Down To Earth finds out how once-parched and barren district of Rajasthan, Barmer now sees development all around, thanks to the flood and rains.