-The Indian Express Sahara India, which is already being investigated by market regulator Sebi, has now also come under the scanner of the provident fund department and is amongst the top defaulters of the Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) in the country. Five of the group firms including Sahara India Financial Corporation and the former Sahara Airlines are part of the top 50 companies in the country that have defaulted on depositing...

-The Telegraph Kolkata: The Mamata Banerjee government is scrambling to stitch together a cogent response to the default crisis that is escalating by the hour. The ruling establishment's agony has been compounded by the close ties several of its ministers, MPs and MLAs had nurtured with the collapsed Saradha Group. Within Trinamul and the government, questions are being asked about what senior leaders and ministers were doing while the crisis was building up...

-The Telegraph Guwahati: Gauhati High Court has taken up a suo motu PIL against the Calcutta-based Saradha Group and similar deposit collecting companies for allegedly duping scores of investors in Assam of their hard-earned money. Official sources said the high court recently took up the PIL (15/2013) after taking cognisance of Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti (KMSS) general secretary and RTI activist Akhil Gogoi's letter to Chief Justice Adarsh Kumar Goel. Akhil had alleged...

-The Times of India CHENNAI: The Centre's recent decision to disclose information related to public-private partnerships (PPP) to RTI applicants may throw a spanner in the works of several infrastructure projects. While RTI activists have hailed the move saying it would usher in greater accountability, private players are cold to the idea as they apprehend the use of RTI to create opposition to projects. Industrial sources said most private firms are not...

-The Telegraph The "Bonzi" edifice, Bengal's version of the fraudulent Ponzi scheme that conned US investors a century ago, is shaking at its foundations. The panic set off by Saradha defaulting on payments has spread to similar schemes run by other firms and triggered protests and attacks on company offices in several parts of the state. These schemes' mostly small-time rural investors have begun to panic about the safety of their hard-earned...