Dear Reader,

In a revelation that strikes at the heart of institutional integrity, the appointment of Santishree Dhulipudi Pandit as Vice Chancellor of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) has triggered serious questions about how India selects its top academic leaders. Documents accessed by The Reporters’ Collective show that a 2009 disciplinary inquiry at the University of Pune found her guilty of “misconduct” and “moral turpitude” in a case involving irregular admissions under the foreign-student quota, resulting in the penalty of withholding seven salary increments.

Yet, this record did not stall her ascent to head the prestigious JNU—a much-coveted anointment in academia. In 2021, her candidature for Vice Chancellor of North Eastern Hill University was reportedly derailed after her vigilance report flagged past misconduct. Remarkably, within a year, she was appointed to lead JNU. The contradiction is stark. Under University Grants Commission regulations, Vice Chancellors are expected to embody the highest standards of integrity and moral authority. Allegations of a compromised selection process, coupled with ongoing campus unrest, have only deepened the unease. At its core, the episode exposes a disquieting gap between regulatory ideals and institutional practice in the top echelons of India’s higher education ecosystem.

India's beleaguered forests faced another blow in January when the Madhya Pradesh government removed almost 400 hectares of a hill town from the boundaries of the Pachmarhi Wildlife Sanctuary, which is part of the larger Satpura Tiger Reserve area. The government has touted this move as a boon for residents of Pachmarhi, allowing them to build taller houses without seeking permission from the Forest Department. However, activists fear that it provides a backdoor entry for large hotels and industries. Previously, since Pachmarhi was within the rules of the reserve, commercial ventures were restricted to ecotourism, which coexisted with the ecology and environment of the protected region.

Ground Report charts the evolution of the easing of restrictions, beginning with its notification under the Wildlife Protection Act in 1977. This was followed by a complete ban on new constructions in 2000 and, finally, relief for residents in September 2025, when the Supreme Court ruled that they should be allowed to build their houses up to three storeys. However, activists argue that the government has interpreted this ruling too liberally by denotifying the entire town. Consequently, with an anticipated influx of tourists, the town is likely to face problems common to tourist destinations, including depleting water supplies and untreated sewage. For the Pachmarhi Reserve—which serves as the meeting point of northern and southern Indian ecosystems—such changes could derail a unique and delicate ecological balance formed over millennia.

Millions of workers migrate across the country each year to work on farms or in orchards in states far from their homes. In Telangana, grape orchards are populated by workers from Bihar, West Bengal, and Odisha, many of whom have been coming seasonally to the state for decades. Through their long experience, they develop the skills to assess fruit bunches for quality, size, and sweetness.

The more senior workers are supervisors, drawing in talent from their own networks back home, forming familial chains that span states. Horticulturists provide these workers with accommodation, vegetable patches, and stoves to sustain themselves, even as the workers repatriate the bulk of their daily wages. With a pronounced shortage of internal migrants within Telangana, these networks are essential for the functioning of specialised agricultural and horticultural produce. The Migration Story tells their story.

The copyright dispute over the song 'Veera Raja Veera' from 'Ponniyin Selvan: II' brings into focus a growing pattern in the Supreme Court of India: a marked reluctance to settle foundational questions in intellectual property law. At stake was not merely a conflict between Ustad Faiyaz Wasifuddin Dagar and A. R. Rahman, but a deeper legal uncertainty about how copyright doctrine applies to Indian classical music—an art form shaped by oral transmission, shared ragas, and lineage-based creativity. The case presented an opportunity to clarify two unresolved issues: the threshold of originality in works rooted in tradition, and the evidentiary standard for proving authorship where formal documentation is absent.

Conflicting rulings from the Delhi High Court had already exposed this doctrinal faultline, with one bench recognising creative authorship in the Dagars’ arrangement of a raga, and another effectively treating the absence of documentary proof as fatal. Yet, when the matter reached the Apex Court, says the Supreme Court Observer, the Court declined to engage. By choosing to broker an interim arrangement and withholding even a prima facie view, it left intact a reasoning that risks narrowing copyright protection for classical traditions. The result is not just an unresolved dispute, but a widening gap in the law’s ability to meaningfully recognise and protect India’s inherited artistic practices, the story asserts.

For more such stories from the grantees this week, please read on.

Warmly,

Sunil Rajshekhar
IPSMF