READING THE BAR CODES

“UPON MY WORD: India’s prisons are stuck in a time warp” STRANGE HOW time’s machine travels back and forth at warp speed. Two hundred and…

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DESERTS – GREENING OF THAR

Lush vegetation in the Thar? Groves jamun trees? Mighty rivers the size of the Ganga and Indus? Seasons of monsoon-like rainfall? None of this is…

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FAITH, HOPE AND NO CHARITY

The International Year of Disabled Persons (IYDP) began with a bang: the National Federation of the Blind led its members in a vociferous agitation in…

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ITC-HAKSAR’S LAST HURRAH

Sentimentality rarely intrudes in­ to shareholders’ meetings, but this one was different. Over 3,000 had gathered in the incongruous setting of a Calcutta cathedral compound…

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GUJRAT-HURRICANE HAVOC

It was a visitation of grief and destruction, a cruel twist to the suffering Gujarat was already shrouded in. Meteorologists first noticed the brewing cyclone…

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A BATTLE SUPREME

Titled Judiciary: At­tacks and Survival, the speech had been long in coming, the speaker delayed, first by an attack of diabetes in March and then…

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MYSTERIOUS U-TURN

Although it is a blasphemous thought, it has cropped up in many a legal mind during the last few weeks: if bets were placed on…

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Cheating The Hangman

Convicted killers Billa and Ranga were expected to make headlines last fortnight. Make news, they certainly did, but not the way everybody anticipated. Instead of…

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Spate Of Senseless Tragedies

Qutab Minar, the 72.5-metre-high monolithic tower that Iltutmish built 750 years ago, witnessed two shocks in its hoary life-span. In 1368, it was struck by…

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HANGING FIRE

The Quality of justice seemed to be under tremendous strain last fortnight. At issue was the vexatious question of capital punishment. As usual, the shock…

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