-The Times of India In the decade or so that i was at the Planning Commission, i always had advisory responsibility for the food ministry/public distribution system, among other issues of development policy. It did not take very long to find out that the fundamental problem with the system was about so-called "leakages" abetted by corruption: One soon learnt that the Food Corporation of India (FCI) was one of the most...

-The Business Standard Govt should streamline its free medicines plan The Centre is reportedly going to shelve a plan to procure generic drugs for free supply to patients throughout the country. This is a serious error. Reportedly, states will instead be asked to do so; but, if a perceived inability to procure, stock and distribute these drugs is the reason for backtracking on the plan, how precisely will states be free of...

-The Hindu "Farming is fascinating. The only thing is that it requires continuous hard-work and devotion without any distraction" says Mr. Barun Singh, a government bank manager-turned-farmer. Mr. Barun Singh maintains a vermi-composting unit in a portion of his 10 acre land. A dairy unit is attached to the composting unit so that the cattle dung can be easily utilized for the process without much labour involvement. Waste materials like dried leaves, rotten...

-The Hindu Minister asks officials to complete the process before the onset of kharif Hyderabad: The government has asked the revenue officials to ensure loan eligibility cards to eligible tenant farmers in the State in 15 days to enable the latter to get credit for farm operations for kharif season beginning this June. Revenue Minister N. Raghuveera Reddy instructed Joint Collectors to facilitate issuing of these cards to the tenants after processing their...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Thursday said that no person should be arrested for posting objectionable comments on social networking sites without permission of senior police officials. The SC has also directed all states and UTs to comply with Centre's advisory on arresting people for their comments on websites. The court on Wednesday had agreed to hear a plea seeking to restrain government authorities from taking any coercive...