India is unilaterally opening its doors to imports of wheat at a time when several contentious issues remain to be settled in the World Trade Organisation. This deliberate step up will result in serious consequences, and weaken the country's bargaining power, writes Ashok B Sharma.

Are quotas the way to redress inequities? A majority of the members of the National Knowledge Commission did not agree, but the UPA government is pressing ahead with its focus on quotas. Two of the NKC's members, Pratap Bhanu Mehta and Andre Beteille, have resigned from the commission.

The top down approach of the Disaster Managment Act had its advantages but completely ignored local knowledge and ways of living. The need is for a judicious mix of the traditional and technological, argues Max Martin.

The Constitution has clearly drawn the Lakshman Rekha for both the Legislature and the Judiciary to maintain their independence in their respective functioning. But what happens when either judges or lawmakers cross this line? Pradeep Baisakh presents an overview of that much maligned term, judicial over-reach.

Policies of privatisation and globalisation are changing not only economies but societies and cultures. At their core is the fight of ideas, and these will be expressed in words. What these words are, and what they mean, therefore, matters greatly, writes Shripad Dharmadhikary.

The World Bank's much touted 'knowledge' products are coming out of a flawed process. The bank hires highly paid consultants who are mostly directed through a system of incentives towards arriving at a pre-determined policy consensus. Information and experiences that run counter to the consensus are ignored. Shripad Dharmadhikary on the implications for India.

In India, other states look at Kerala's record of firsts with envy. Dr Amartya Sen, the Nobel laureate, has hailed it as a model. But Kerala, caught in a web of paradoxes, is not what it seems, writes Ramesh Menon.

The primary role of the navy is the protection of the seaboards. Having been shown up by the recent failure, the security establishment now has to get the strategy right, says Pavan Nair.

"Power to the people" will not be ushered in by the microchip or hydrogen battery, but by a redistribution of wealth. Darryl D'Monte fears the celebrated New York Times columnist may be misplacing his faith.

It is because his own Party stopped taking Gandhi seriously that most young people in India grow up thinking of him as a pious crank, used only as a meaningless icon, writes Madhu Purnima Kishwar.

Instead of bothering itself with luxury pens, a truly egalitarian society would focus its attention on the emancipatory possiblities inherent in wielding a pen, write Venu Madhav Govindu and Deepak Malghan.

Popular ideas of development and management of common resources should be revisited in light of this year's Economics Nobel Prize, given to Prof. Elinor Ostrom, writes Prakash Kashwan.

The inability of India to adequately provide for its own population no longer reflects a failure of implementation, but rather of a failure of innovation, writes Aditya Dev Sood.

Can we tap into the power of crowds and popular fashion to address persistent poverty? And what would such an effort look like, wonders Gijs Spoor.

The issue of parental authority to resort to corporeal punishment on children is a matter still hotly debated in large sections of our society writes Shankar Jaganathan.

Kalpavriksh - LEAD India, paperback, Rs.100 / U.S. $10
Related Article: The Road to Destruction

Uma Chakravarty turns the pages of Deepti Priya Mehrotra's stories of single mothers.

The Age of Consent is a clarion call to implausible action. But maybe that's the point - to urge that we ask why the obviously good outcomes seem so unlikely.

Unlimited Girls explores the ideas and experiences of feminism in contemporary urban India. Sameera Khan reviews Paromita Vohra's film.

Jemma Purdey reviews Yuva, Mani Ratnam's latest effort, and finds an unexplained mix of uplifting and sad realities.

Shashi Tharoor finds that Nehru's imprint on India rests on four tenets. But each of these must be understood in light of the events and values of its own time. Our judgement of this important figure cannot be determined exclusively by our approval or repudiation of those tenets today. Venu Madhav Govindu reviews The Invention of India.

Acute poverty linked to armed conflict and displacement is a major reason for the growing number of commercial sex workers in Manipur. Drug abuse too is common, further impacting those turning to the world's oldest profession. Thingnam Anjulika Samom reports.

Raging violence across the state continues to take the lives of young men in Manipur. For the young widows left behind, the struggle for survival is fraught with newly added responsibilities, for which many of them are ill-prepared. Thingnam Anjulika Samom reports.

For decades now the beautiful state of Manipur has been wracked by a violent insurgency and torn by the excesses of a draconian army. Anjali Nayar visits the state, bringing back poignant tales and the feeling of what it is like to live with fear.

The Budhan Theatre Group has become the nexus for a movement to change attitudes towards denotified tribes both within Ahmedabad's Chharanagar community and outside it.

Traditionally, India's dairy cooperative societies have been run by men, but this is gradually changing. Today, 18% of cooperative members are women, and nearly 2500 all-women cooperatives are functioning in the country. Sunanda Nehru Ganju reports from Gujarat, where new livelihoods for women are being established this way.

"Like thousands of other ordinary Indians I had rushed to Gujarat to lend a helping hand. And in the two weeks spent there I got to see up close, many dimensions of our innate, if imperfect, humanity." Venu Madhav Govindu remembers a relief camp he called home five years ago.

The violent assertiveness against Aamir Khan is part of a larger trend, marked by politicians who have instilled the language with idioms of aggression. But as they mobilise to silence the 'other' voices in the Narmada struggle, 'we' lose too, for it is only a short step from here to gagging ourselves, says Himanshu Upadhyaya.

The Gujarat state government appears to have very little planned by way of support for the education of Muslim children. What's more the education department appears to be standing in the way of the embattled community's attempts to help itself. Deepa A has more.

An ongoing study of school textbooks in four states has found stereotypes and biases in Gujarat's textbooks. The Social Studies textbook for standard five has nine stories on mythology masquerading as history. Deepa A reports.

The doors of homes in Rehmat Nagar, Godhra, are opened by children, and sometimes by women. Men are rarely to be seen around. The world outside the settlement refers to them as "POTA families", a description that encapsulates their precarious present and future. Deepa A has more.

Following his earlier acclaimed films, Rakesh Sharma has released two new Gujarati documentaries earlier this month. The films -- Sharma has even used RTI to collect government data -- expose unsavoury truths about farmers suicides as well as lower-caste rioters now in prison. Shoma Chatterji reports.

It is not only those whose villages have been submerged who have suffered, but hundreds of families have lost land to the building of Sardar Sarovar itself. Neeta Deshpande reports.

In the shadow of the Narmada dam, those displaced by the canal once hoped that its water would irrigate their fields. Little did they know how their lives would turn out. Neeta Deshpande reports.

Labour contractors and large landowners continue to employ children, often exposing them to vulnerable situations. Extreme poverty in Rajasthan's tribal districts fuels the practice. Pradeep Baisakh reports.

The famed textile industry of Surat is one of the pillars of Gujarat's industrial success story. What is less known about it is the unfortunate reality of rampant child employment and exploitation that prevails there. Shirish Khare reports.

Less than 50 per cent of girl child births are being registered by parents because of gender bias, says former Census Commissioner Jayant Banthia, speaking at a Panchayats and Child Rights convention recently at New Delhi. Nitin Jugran Bahuguna reports.

Tribal societies and groups belonging to the Scheduled Tribes in India are traditionally known to have been relatively gender-unbiased, but recent reports and statistics point to a deteriorating child sex ratio in these communities, too. Shambhu Ghatak analyses the findings.

An INASAF investigation finds the state grossly indifferent to the health, medical needs, and humane treatment of its prisoners, some of whom haven't even received trials.

During the last four to five years, the soil in several parts of Punjab has been regenerated and rejuvenated. Natural farmers are convinced it is working. The movement is led by experienced farmers who believe in Guru Nanak's tenet of Sarbat da bhala (well being of all). Umendra Dutt writes about the transformative work hundreds of farmers are doing.

Behind the concern for girls and women, some of it genuine, is both fear and a desire to control, says Kalpana Sharma.

No sane person can accept the immorality of using economic and military superiority to bludgeon inconvenient nations into falling in line, says Kalpana Sharma.

The most flexible information dissemination medium ever invented can still be used for the betterment of all, says Subramaniam Vincent.

By tearing up the global rulebook, the US is in fact undermining its own imperial rule, but in this there lies an opportunity for global democracy, says George Monbiot.

In the passing of Kalpana Chawla, the genuine feeling of loss expressed by so many reveals the thirst amongst the young for role models, says Kalpana Sharma.

Nothing exposes the hollowness of the claims corporations now make to intellectual property as much as their own histories, says George Monbiot.

While arguing that he is doing what he is to make the world more peaceful and stable, in fact George Bush has pushed the world closer to greater conflict and war, says Kalpana Sharma.

Those who devise television programmes on cricket seem convinced that women have neither brains, nor common sense, says Kalpana Sharma.

There is now a quiet but intense debate within some segments of the corporate sector on the crisis in governance due to communalism, says Rajni Bakshi.

Last month, women's groups were engaged in a vigorous debate with the National Commission on Women (NCW) about a bill on sexual harassment, says Kalpana Sharma.