-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Being the global host of this year's World Environment Day (June 5) with 'Beat Plastic Pollution' as its theme, the Centre has written to all states and Union Territories (UTs) to undertake a massive campaign against use of single-use plastics and enforce rules to ensure elimination of plastic carry bags of less than 50 microns in thickness. Though the Centre had banned polythene bags below 50...

-The Hindu Not conducted hearings: RTI reply The State commission to ensure delivery of public services has been inactive sINCe its INCeption in 2015, an RTI reply by the West Bengal government has revealed. The West Bengal Right to Public Service Commission has not conducted any hearing sINCe its INCeption and is unable to provide any information about it through RTI, an activist claimed. The RTI queries were filed by Kolkata-based Biswanath Goswami. The...

-The Hindu Paddy and sugarcane are India’s most water-guzzling crops — using up over half of the country’s total irrigation water resources — but procurement policies and water and power subsidies are skewing profitability and distorting crop decisions, says a recent study done by agricultural economist Ashok Gulati, and Gayathri Mohan. It has been published as a working paper by the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER). The ICRIER...

-The Indian Express The Dalit villagers alleged that the attacks followed an order by the pradhan, Pramod Rana, at a panchayat in the Gujjar-dominated village. Baghpat: FORTY-EIGHT hours after members of the Gujjar community attacked two Dalit teenagers of Kamala village in Baghpat, about a third of its Dalit homes stood deserted. All the young women had been sent away “as precaution”. Akash Khondwal, 19, a BA student, is on ventilator support...

-Business Standard/ India Spend Delays in wage payment have been a constant throughout MGNREGS implementation Bachcha Lal’s shirt hung loosely over his frail body, exposing his sunken collarbones, as he stood outside his straw-thatched home in central Uttar Pradesh’s (UP) Bundelkhand region. “They all rely on me,” he said, pointing towards his tubercular son, daughter-in-law and grand-daughter. Illiterate and a landless labourer, 65-year-old Lal makes about Rs 175 a day when he...