February 27th, 2007
The Mashelkar committee report on Indian patent laws has raised much controversy. Apart from being anti-national, it has been accused of plagiarism as some lines were lifted ad verbatim from a report by Shamnad Basheer. Whether inadvertent or deliberate, the charges of plagiarism have only damaged the credibility of the committee and I am glad [...]
February 26th, 2007
Two interesting stories,
First, a coalition of companies and the U.S government has launched to campaigin to popularize the use of energy-efficient light bulbsThe 18Seconds movement is aimed at getting Americans to replace electricity-wasting incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs that are up to five times more efficient and last several times longer.The campaign — [...]
February 25th, 2007
Global warming is most certainly the hot button issue of the day. Recently, a U.N panel held that global warming is ‘most likely’ caused by human activities and concluded that it has become ”a runaway train that cannot be stopped.” Unfortunately, as it usually happens in such cases, the debate has become completely politicized and [...]
February 22nd, 2007
The HPV vaccine issue in Texas is a classic policy example of ends versus means with a little bit of wacky ideological mixed in for good measure. The genital human pappillomavirus (HPV) is known to cause cervical cancer among women and the chances of an average person getting the disease is quite high. “Since it [...]
February 22nd, 2007
The new Palna Scheme proposed by the Union Women and Child Department aims at curbing female foeticide and to check the skewed sex ratio in the country.
The scheme will be implemented by the ministry of women and child development in coordination with state governments, and is likely to be put in place during the 11th [...]
February 22nd, 2007
There is little doubt that primary education in India is in doldrums and needs urgent reforms. Our public schools lack basic facilities, have outdated curriculum and suffer from crumbling infrastructure. Primary education is a public good and hence a fit case for public investment. This is not merely a utilitarian argument but a moral [...]
February 19th, 2007
Through an opinion piece in The Hindu, Prof Gautam R. Desiraju argues that an important reason for India’s lag behind China in terms of scientific output is the lack of research infrastructure at the undergraduate level.
A major area of investment in Chinese universities is the upgrading of undergraduate teaching labs. We spend almost nothing [...]
February 18th, 2007
Robert W. Klein is right on the money.
In an effort to expand program participation and reduce disaster aid, the number of insurance-eligible crops and the amount of federal subsidies going to the insurance program have increased dramatically since 1938. This expansion has come at a high cost, even in recent years; from 2000 to [...]
February 18th, 2007
China is sitting on more than 1 trillion$ of foreign reserves. So what will it do with all that money? Offer aid. However, Chinese aid practices are raising some concerns.
His story is about Nigeria’s trains. The Nigerian government operates three railways, [...]
February 15th, 2007
M Bukri Musa explains why micro credit, so sucessful in Bangladesh, has failed to deliver the same results elsewhere.
But these well-intentioned endeavors will fail — as with the Malaysian experience — if they focus only on lending, and not on changing underlying attitudes and behavior. The Malaysian initiative could be enhanced by not linking the [...]