Solutions to Change

Prepared by Madhu.S, Team Lead, Centre for Public Policy Research Google has set the revolution, led the revolution and might kill the revolution. That's what is predicted from the latest Google Privacy Policy woes. UK has asked the search engine (a bigger state entity indeed!!) to revisit few of the privacy provisions in terms of the UK Data Protection laws. Brazil have issued notice on them stating direct infringement of the privacy of their individuals, while other non-US state entities are increasingly worried of protecting their privacy than protecting their citizens. India which does not have a Privacy or a Data Protection policy of its own, still owes allegiance to the Supreme Court rulings on Privacy as a constitutional and fundamental right. The Indian Government has now approved the privacy policy without any riders The latest censure notice by the Government on Google, Facebook, Yahoo etc, had created enough virtual criticism to the government, that Kapil Sibal,...

Former Justice Markandey Katju has been hogging the media headlines for his bold comments on Media and related things. He started with the need to include mass media under the Press Council, to the famous equation of media with 'low level of intellectual capacity'. This was further fomented by 'media offering opium to masses' and taking a dig on media's highlights after Dev Anand's death, with the statement that "The country is facing several socio economic problems, there is poverty, price rise and incidents like farmers suicide. Isn't all that more important". He has also condemned the practice of media in abstaining from regulations mentioning that ''Self-regulation is no regulation''. Katju has however justified all his comments which was aimed at cleansing the muddy state of affairs in the media houses. Many critics feel that, this was more of a problem of chosing the wrong candidate for the right post and condemning judges a...

India is the largest gold consuming economy as per World Gold Council, accounting for nearly 20 percent of world’s gold demand. Gold is not merely a product and commodity in India, but is integrated with our culture as a precious metal. Though adulteration of gold has been rampant for centuries, recent instances involving presence of metals like ruthenium and iridium within gold has created panic, mostly because they are radioactive and being similar to gold cannot be identified by simple apparatus available in local laboratories. Hallmark is an official mark, granted by Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) certified representatives, which act as a third party assurance and certification that the customer gets the right purity of gold(or silver) for the given price(value for money). As on today, hallmarking of gold is not compulsory, but only a voluntary process for gold merchants. Currently, only 81 items are to compulsorily certified in India. It is surprising to note that items like ...