-The Telegraph New Delhi: A parliamentary panel has voiced shock that a scholarship for underprivileged meritorious students had not been revised since the scheme was launched in 2008, leaving it at less than half of what households now spend on average on a higher secondary student. According to a survey on social consumption, households spend Rs 12,619 a year on a plus-2 student's schooling, while the yearly amount under the National Means-cum-Merit...

-Down to Earth Sri Sri Ravishankar’s organisation went back on its commitment to pay the fine for hosting a THRee-day festival that affected Yamuna floodplains The Art of Living Foundation, which is led by spiritual guru Sri Sri Ravishankar, must pay remaining Rs 4.75-crore fine for hosting a massive festival on the banks of the River Yamuna in Delhi, the National Green Tribunal (NGT) said today. Strongly criticising organisation for going ahead...

-The Hindu Business Line UN panel cites social norms, costs among barriers to digital inclusion of poor women New Delhi: Wide gender gaps in access to the internet as well as mobile phone ownership THReaten to “leave women behind” as countries develop, says a report by the UN high-level panel, calling for digital inclusion, especially of poor women, to achieve one of the key Sustainable Development Goals — economic empowerment of women...

-The Hindu Business Line At present only 84 Central schemes are under DBT New Delhi: Hoping to give a push to its ambitious scheme for cash transfer of subsidies, the Centre is in talks with nodal ministries and implementing agencies to expand the ambit of direct benefit transfer and Aadhaar seeding to all 536 schemes by the end of the year. “The objective is that service providers as well as service receivers in...

-PTI “Repercussions from the currency exchange initiative will likely persist THRough the first quarter of 2017.” Washington: India’s demonetisation led to huge cash shortages that have “adversely affected” consumption and like a “vacuum cleaner” it sucked in cash and then was slowly replacing the currency, a senior IMF official has said. “You’ve heard about so-called ‘helicopter drops’ of money with unconventional monetary policies, so one way to characterise this demonetisation initiative is as...