Stories written by Ranjit Devraj
Regional editor Ranjit Devraj, based in Delhi, takes care of the journalistic production from the Asia and Pacific region. He handles a group of influential writers based in places like Bangkok, Rangoon, Tehran, Dubai, Karachi, Colombo, Melbourne, Beijing and Tokyo, among many others. He coordinates with the editor in chief and forms part of the IPS editorial team. Ranjit Devraj has been an IPS correspondent in India since 1997. Prior to that he was a special correspondent with the United News of India news agency. Assignments for UNI included development of the agency’s overseas operations, particularly in the Gulf region. Devraj counts two years in the trenches (1989-1990) covering the violent Gorkha autonomy movement in the Darjeeling Hills as most valuable in a career of varied journalistic experience.

DEVELOPMENT-INDIA: Series of Scams Leaves Government Unfazed

By Ranjit Devraj
For a party that came to power in 1998 vowing to root out corruption, Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has performed pretty dismally and with general elections due next year, the boot is now clearly on the other foot.

POLITICS-INDIA: Religion Takes Back Seat in Key Provincial Polls

By Ranjit Devraj
The big surprise in this week's elections in four north Indian states in the Hindi-speaking heartland is the fact that religion has played an insignificant role, compared to issues such as power supply, drought relief and the sheer performance of incumbent governments.

/CORRECTED REPEAT/TRADE: Indo-European Summit Tries to Narrow Differences

By Ranjit Devraj
India and the European Union inched toward narrowing differences in difficult trade issues, including the pace of liberalisation that developing countries are comfortable with, at a major two-day business summit that closed in the capital on Saturday.

SOUTH ASIA: All Quiet on World’s Highest, Coldest, Costliest Battlefield

By Ranjit Devraj
For the first time in two decades, the big guns have fallen silent on the world's highest, coldest and costliest battlefield because India and Pakistan saw the wisdom of extending the Eid ceasefire in Kashmir this week all the way to the Siachen glacier.

SOUTH ASIA: All Quiet on World’s Highest, Coldest, Costliest Battlefield

By Ranjit Devraj
For the first time in two decades, the big guns have fallen silent on the world's highest, coldest and costliest battlefield because India and Pakistan saw the wisdom of extending the Eid ceasefire in Kashmir this week all the way to the Siachen glacier.

INDIA: Gujarat Pogrom Continues to Raise Questions on Democracy

By Ranjit Devraj
A year after sweeping elections in western Gujarat state by spurring India's worst communal carnage in its post-independence era, Chief Minister Narendra Modi continues to stretch and distort accepted definitions of democracy.

INDIA: To Get Justice, Venue of Pogrom Cases May be Shifted

By Ranjit Devraj
In a stinging rebuke to the pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in western Gujarat state, India's Supreme Court Friday indicated that it may order the transfer of cases relating to last year's pogrom against the Muslim community outside the state in the interests of ensuring justice for the victims.

INDIA: Fight over Jobs Turns into Ethnic War

By Ranjit Devraj
A fight over coveted jobs in India's massive railway system has turned into an ugly ethnic conflagration, leading to the deaths of at least 30 Hindi-speaking settlers this week in the north-eastern Assam state, where the army has been deployed to stop the carnage.

POLITICS-INDIA: Fight over Jobs Turns into Ethnic War

By Ranjit Devraj
A fight over coveted jobs in India's massive railway system has turned into an ugly ethnic conflagration, leading to the deaths of at least 30 Hindi-speaking settlers this week in the north-eastern Assam state, where the army has been out since Wednesday to stop the carnage.

INDIA: Despite Hurdles, More Women Contest Polls Than Ever Before

By Ranjit Devraj
For more than five years now, India's Parliament has seen the spectacle of major political parties closing ranks to thwart a bill that seeks to reserve a third of its seats for women. Still, women are steadily making inroads into the overwhelmingly male preserve of electoral politics.

POLITICS-INDIA: Hidden Camera Fells Another Ruling Party Stalwart

By Ranjit Devraj
Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) suffered a setback amid heated campaigning for state elections after a party leader, filmed allegedly receiving bribes to facilitate mining rights, was forced to resign as junior environment minister on Monday.

INDIA: Technology Helps Untangle Red Tape in Communications

By Ranjit Devraj
Technology is coming to the aid of reformers determined to leapfrog over a tangle of licences and permits that have held back India's communication sector for decades.

DEVELOPMENT-INDIA: Tea Industry Gets No Cheer from Falling Prices

By Ranjit Devraj
This month's burning alive of 21 people in India's West Bengal state by tea garden workers, angered by fresh recruitments, is the surest sign yet that India's once famous tea industry is now in deep distress.

RIGHTS-INDIA: Arrests Stayed, But Raises Fears of Muzzling Media

By Ranjit Devraj
While the Supreme Court on Monday stayed the arrest of six journalists as ordered by the Tamil Nadu state government, concern continues that the episode is but one more sign of the repression by its chief minister.

RIGHTS-INDIA: Death Sentence Sends Tough – if Delayed – Message

By Ranjit Devraj
When a court awarded Congress party politician Sushil Sharma the death sentence on Friday, eight years had elapsed since the night he was caught by a beat constable stuffing the bullet-ridden body of his wife into the oven of a well-known open-air restaurant in the heart of the city.

ENVIRONMENT: India is Dumping Ground for Toxic Mercury – Activists

By Ranjit Devraj
Thanks to its lax laws, India continues to import toxic mercury and has now replaced the United States as the biggest consumer of the liquid metal and its compounds, activists here say.

POLITICS-SOUTH ASIA: Go Beyond Diplomatese, Peace Activists Say

By Ranjit Devraj
It comes as no surprise that India's latest peace offensive on Pakistan has become bogged down over the disputed territory of Kashmir, but experts say it is important to see beyond the diplomatese and doggedly pursue dialogue in the interest of peace on the subcontinent.

HEALTH-INDIA: Firecrackers, Cold Weather Help Ward off Dengue

By Ranjit Devraj
The noise from firecrackers during the Indian festival of light or Diwali and the onset of cold weather it marks were more than welcome news for experts this year, who attribute to them the sudden drop in the number of dengue cases here in the capital.

INDIA: Opposition Leader’s Foreign Origins a Poll Issue – Again

By Ranjit Devraj
A month ahead of the Dec. 1 state elections in India, the most visible issue seems to be the foreign origins of Sonia Gandhi, chief of the Congress party and leader of the national opposition in Parliament.

HEALTH-INDIA: New HIV/AIDS Funds Won’t Go to Free Anti-Retrovirals

By Ranjit Devraj
India has received a pledge of 200 million dollars from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to fight HIV/AIDS, but none of this money will go toward anti-retrovirals, which activists say could help alleviate the suffering of some four million people living with the virus.
     Emphasis will continue to be on ''prevention rather than cure'', according to a Health Ministry official.

HEALTH-INDIA: New HIV/AIDS Funds Won’t Go to Free Anti-Retrovirals

By Ranjit Devraj
India has just been pledged 200 million U.S. dollars to fight HIV/AIDS by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, but none of this money will go toward anti-retrovirals, which activists say could help alleviate the suffering of some 4 million people living with the virus.
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