Displaced people in Manipur

Manipur’s Displaced Still Waiting for Home: Crisis Resolution Needs to Move From Relief to Restoration

Manipur therefore needs to move beyond the language of relief and towards the language of restoration. The ultimate measure of recovery will not be how many camps have closed. It will be how many families can safely return, rebuild their livelihoods, educate their children, access justice and live without fear.

Capital Crime - and the Anatomy of Impunity in India

The Chopra siblings' murder in 1978, the Nirbhaya case of 2012, R.G. Kar Kolkata in 2024 and Kalkaji in 2026 belong to different historical contexts.  Yet they reveal a recurring difficulty in Indian governance: we are capable of extraordinary mobilisation after extraordinary violence, yet less consistent at converting that mobilisation into permanent institutional practice.

The Indian Government Should not Pick Sides in Tata Conflict

The Tata group is a national icon, a picture of enterprise, growth and service packed in a business model that many Indians cherish and hold as an exemplar. That model, in which the bulk of a great enterprise’s profits flows to charitable trusts for the public good, is rare anywhere in the world. 

India’s Housing Challenge: Bridging the Gap Between Macro Development and Basic Needs

Aggressive migration of youth and workers to metro cities in search of better opportunities is common across the region. And so is the response deficit by local and central governments in providing them with basic, dignified lifestyles. The time has come for the elected representatives to think differently and narrow the gap between government schemes and results on the ground. 

More on Governance, Public Policy and Law

Digital Public Infrastructure in South Asia: A Bridge or a New Divide?

These achievements have positioned India as a digital governance exporter. Singapore, Nepal, Bhutan, France, Mauritius, Sri Lanka, and the United Arab Emirates have already established UPI connectivity, and more than 50 countries have expressed interest in replicating aspects of India Stack’s open digital infrastructure. 

Who Governs Islamabad? A Capital Without its Governance

This raises the issue not whether Islamabad has surpassed its outmoded and fragmented administrative structure but whether governance would keep pace with its growth. Islamabad has to evolve from being administered as a capital city into being governed as a metropolis.
 

Whither Constitutional Equality and Laws Against Discrimination? A Manipuri Musician's Murder Raises Governance Questions Anew

The inhabitants of Manipur have had long-standing experiences of living insecurely in their own homeland, even as migrants from the Northeast have encountered prejudice in metropolitan India....India has produced a paradox where communities that belong formally to India can also face exclusion from the social mainstream.

When Development Uproots the Roots: Reimagining India's Development Policy

Before asking how quickly a project can be implemented, policymakers should ask whether it can be redesigned to reduce displacement. Before acquiring new land, can existing degraded land be used? Can infrastructure be built around communities rather than communities being moved around infrastructure?

The Forensic-Security Convergence: Mitigating Cross-Border Identity Fraud and Financial Subversion

Identity and financial crimes that occur across India's borders never begin with anything overtly fraudulent. They generally begin with a small breach in routine authentication processes. Biometrics, forensic document examination, and audit trails can each 

Constitutional Supremacy vs. Parliamentary Sovereignty Debate: Parliament is a Creature of the Constitution, not its Master

India’s constitutional design operates on the line of a fully functional parliamentary democracy anchored in constitutional supremacy rather than parliamentary sovereignty. In an era of evolving challenges, the supremacy of the Constitution continues to serve as the ultimate safeguard of Indian polity.

Born Together, Governed Apart: How India and Pakistan Became Two Different Political Civilizations

Eighty years after Partition, the overarching lesson of this comparative history of India and Pakistan is that national trajectories are not preordained by culture, talent, or geography. They are determined by the rules and values a state enshrines for itself in its formative years.

Re-engineering India's Grassroots Administration: A New Bottom-Up Development Model

It is time the Indian district administration’s focus shifts to economic development and prosperity-building through strategic planning, resource mobilisation, and effective resource allocation; productivity enhancement, competitiveness, skill-building, employment generation and ensuring the security of life and property.

Imran Khan, the Cricketing World and the Paradox Confronting Pakistan

The man who once led Pakistan to its only World Cup triumph has now become the subject of an international cricketing appeal for humane treatment. The more the authorities try to keep his story behind prison walls, the more the cricketing world appears determined to take it beyond them.

Pakistan's "Collapsed" System: Military Power Cannot Substitute for Political Legitimacy or Economic Development

The common thread running through the remarks of Asif, Naqvi and Fazlur Rehman is that Pakistan's problem is no longer simply who governs it. It is how it is governed. Asif's comparison with India highlights the widening developmental gap.

Judicial Exceptionalism in Imran Khan's Medical Case: Question of Equality Before Law in Pakistan

It will answer a question Pakistan's judiciary cannot avoid indefinitely: will courts now extend this standard of care to every other prisoner in the country, or does it remain, in practice, a privilege of rank.

Jharkhand’s Unfulfilled Promise: Gen Z Sends a Clear Political Message From Ranchi

Jharkhand's challenge, therefore, is larger than filling vacancies. It is to rebuild the social contract between statehood and aspiration. The generation now protesting did not create Jharkhand. It inherited the dream. Its question is whether that dream has become a lived reality.

Gen Z Should Guard Against Political Hijacking of Their Movement and Concerns

The challenge before Gen Z is therefore not to remain apolitical. It is to remain politically aware without becoming politically captive; to raise legitimate issues, demand change and participate in democracy, while retaining the independence to decide where the movement should go.

80 Years On, Is India Still Being Policed by the Raj?

Eighty years ago India lowered the Union Jack and raised the tricolor. It did not, however, lower the 1861 Police Act. It was amended and sections renamed but the colonial DNA remained in place: that the citizen is a subject to be controlled, not an empowered  rights bearer to be heard.

Two Years After the July Uprising, Bangladesh's Press Freedom Remains Under Question

Another defining feature of Bangladesh's current media environment is the emergence of "mob culture." The attack on The Daily Star and Prothom Alo offices is a serious example of mob attack. Media owners often hesitate to invite commentators associated with the previous government or opposing political viewpoints because they fear public backlash, protests, or attacks