Seeking to provide a level-playing field for parties in elections, the Election Commission has proposed making paid news an electoral offence to provide a strong deterrent in a bid to stamp out the menace. It also wants a ceiling on the campaign expenditure of political parties that is used as a ruse to pump in unlimited resources.
There is no specific requirement for a private company under the new legal framework to appoint a company secretary.
Four Italian marines, who were witness to the killing of fishermen off Kerala coast allegedly by two of their colleagues, have refused to come to India for deposing as witness, which will further delay the case.
The government and opposition were on Thursday united in criticising the functioning of the judiciary while seeking to scrap the collegium system of appointing judges to higher courts, saying it is essential to restore the delicate balance of power which has been disturbed.
The Central Bureau of Investigation is likely to press before the Supreme Court that its demand for autonomy is legitimate and will pave the way for curbing interference in its functioning, two days after the government junked the agency's proposal for more power for its director.
The service conditions and judges' remuneration are not alluring .
Govt depts, banks prone to information leakage.
A proposal to set up a panel of retired judges to oversee the investigations of the Central Bureau of Investigation to insulate it from political interference is in conformity with existing legal provisions, Finance Minister P Chidambaram indicated on Friday.
As Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal remains adamant on his stand of resigning if the Jan Lokpal Bill is not passed in the ongoing Assembly session, Lt Governor Najeeb Jung on Friday said that the ombudsman bill cannot be tabled as it has not been approved by him.
After having gone out on a limb over the creation of Telangana, the UPA government is expected to go for the kill and do whatever it takes to pass the bill in Lok Sabha. But the question remains whether the Congress would really be able to push the bill in the noise and confusion. Renu Mittal reports.
Pakistan Cricket Board Chairman Zaka Ashraf might step down or could be told by President Asif Zardari to resign in the next few days following the dismal show of the team in the ongoing Champions Trophy.
Time is running out for a hapless UPA govt over the Telangana bill, and the latest observation by the Rajya Sabha secretariat -- that the bill has financial implications and so must be introduced and passed in the Lok Sabha first -- has only worsened the crisis for the ruling alliance. Anita Katyal reports.
'Now, we have a minimum pension of Rs 1,000 annually.'
The Congress may get chairmanship of the prestigious Public Accounts of Committee but still there is no guarantee whether it will get the post of Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha.
A whopping Rs 30,000 crore is likely to be spent by the government, political parties and candidates in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, making it by far the most expensive electoral exercise in Indian history.
After gay sex, there are now moves to decriminalise suicide attempts under a bill introduced in Parliament.
On the eve of the Modi government's two years in office, the RSS-linked Bharatiya Mazdoor Sabha leadership met Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. After the meeting, the BMS claimed the FM told its delegation 'the government has realised that labour reforms are not essential for industrial growth in the country.'
Apart from Smriti, Ravi Shankar Prasad and Ananth Kumar took over as law and parliamentary affairs ministers respectively.
According to SFIO, the modus operandi of the Reebok fraud involved filing fictitious invoices to show inflated sales, recording fictitious sales by raising prices of goods sold.
In writing to the government for a change in the law, the Election Commission has actually acknowledged the future possibility of countermanding polls to curb the use of money power, says N Sathiyamoorthy.
In a move that is bound to generate controversy, the election expenditure for both Parliamentary and assembly constituencies is likely to jump by one-and-a-half times before the coming Lok Sabha polls. Anita Katyal reports
Assembly elections in Bihar, where the Bharatiya Janata Party is set for a battle against a united Janata Parivar, are likely to be held sometime in September-October when extensive central forces and a reworked expenditure monitoring system will be deployed to curb money and muscle power.
It will escalate costs, mandate regulator to check malpractices, set standards.
Although the Congress leadership and UPA has given its nod for Telangana, the road to the separate state is surely going to be a complicated one, reports Anita Katyal.
Following objection from petitioners who claimed conflict of interest.
The nullifying of the NJAC Act has put the spotlight on the Judiciary. Concepts like transparency, being open to change, leading from front, management of perceptions that were reserved for the Executive earlier are now relevant for the Judiciary as well, says Sanjeev Nayyar.
'Let us not say that Modi has not delivered on anything; he has delivered something and in parts substantially, but he has to also deliver on a large number of his electoral promises.'
The Supreme Court on Thursday termed as a "serious issue" a plea seeking initiation of removal process of former Chief Justice of India K G Balakrishnan from the post of National Human Rights Commission chairman for his alleged "misbehaviour" and purchase of benami properties.
The United Progressive Alliance government's efforts to rein in the judiciary may come unstuck as its ambitious bill scrapping the collegium system of appointing judges to the Supreme Court and high courts as the Bharatiya Janata Party is unlikely to allow the passage in the ongoing Parliament session.
In a huge setback for Ranjit Sinha, the Supreme Court on Thursday asked the CBI director to withdraw himself from overseeing the investigation into the 2G spectrum case.
'It is a very vital issue and we cannot keep it pending. We intend to pass an order as to who will hear the matter.'
Amidst reports of Congress' confabulations with the Rashtriya Janata Dal for a secular alliance in Bihar in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Monday took a dig at Chief Minister Nitish Kumar for the Congress preferring Lalu Prasad over him and said such an 'opportunistic' alliance was not a cause of worry for it.
The Telangana Group of Ministers on Friday reviewed the progress made by the Andhra Pradesh government with regards to the bifurcation of the state on various fronts.
The birth of India's 29th state will be delayed if the President's rule in Andhra Pradesh is not passed in Parliament before April 30, reveals Governor ESL Narasimhan's "top secret " letter to Pranab Mukherjee
'Power sits lightly on Arun Jaitley's shoulders. Just because earth-shaking election results have brought his party in power, he has not gone recklessly ambitious. "Too soon, too fast" is not what he likes,' says Sheela Bhatt/Rediff.com about Budget 2014.
India pacer Shantakumaran Sreesanth and his Rajasthan Royals team mate Ankeet Chavan and Ajit Chandila were on Sunday cleared of charges by a Delhi court in the spot-fixing and betting scandal in the sixth edition of the Indian Premier League in 2013. A flashback of the events that unfolded in the episode.
Should the Karnataka high court deliver a verdict in the Jayalalithaa case on Thursday, the Supreme Court bench on Friday could pass orders in her bail extension plea that may end up staying the former ruling, reports N Sathiya Moorthy.
In Indian elections today, India's Chief Election Commissioner V S Sampath says, "Muscle Power has been replaced by 'Money Power,'" adding that the Election Commission's greatest dilemma is worrying about how the media can be prevented from influencing the outcome in the coming general election.
'Nehru is often portrayed as a visionary with his head in the clouds. But he had his feet firmly planted on the ground when it came to building and nurturing institutions and setting them on the right path with the right traditions,' says B S Raghavan.
The decision of the Union Cabinet based on the Group of Ministers recommendations only creates an illusion by removing the political executive and creating a proxy institution instead, says Arun Jaitley