Governance and Political Studies
Integrity and Ethics in the Civil Service

In order to understand the topic of this paper perhaps it would be best to have clearly before us the definition of the issues we are addressing. For this purpose resort was had to the new Oxford Dictionary of English. There are four words whose ....

CAG and The Indian Constitution

In India, it has become customary to abuse the Constitution and/or Constitutional Authority whenever a political party or a political leader is in trouble for its or his misdeeds. Let us not forget that this began with Jawaharlal Nehru himself and ....

Grandma’s Remedies for Governance Issues

I was a stripling short of twenty-three years when I joined as Assistant Collector at Morena after completing my training at the IAS Training School at Metcalfe House. Morena can be frightfully hot in the summer and my training required almost consta....

Special Laws to Counter Terrorism in India: A Reality Check

A National Convention held recently in New Delhi on ‘Politics of Terror’ has brought to focus the need to re-look into provisions of special laws that are currently in use to counter terrorism. When confronted with armed militancy, democracies fa....

Constitutionalism Versus Adventurism

The Constitution of India, despite the amendments which have been introduced from time to time, has a high degree of immutability, partly because its basic structure is sound, partly because it establishes a balance between public good and the const....

Building a Self Cleansing Environment

One of the defining moments in my life was when I was on deputation to Princeton University for a mid-career course. It was the height of the Vietnamese War and the United States was in ferment because many people, especially students, opposed the wa....

JPCs must have The Power to Summon Ministers

Archaic rules and deep divisions along political lines within the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) probing the controversial 2G Spectrum sale has affected the efficacy and sanctity of parliamentary investigations. While the controversy over the co....

An Object Lesson for Indian Political Parties

China is not a democracy and there is the one party rule of the Communist Party of China (CPC). From time to time the Party holds party meetings at which matters of policy are discussed in detail. The 16th CPC Central Committee meeting wa....

India Shining? Or India, The Dark Continent?

The newspaper headlines and electronic media such as NDTV24×7, Times Now, CNN-IBN keeps screaming at us that India is the land of scams, the very fountainhead of corruption. On the one hand are the Indian people – harried, betrayed, looted by thos....

Contact Us