-PTI Pawar says sugarcane planting has not yet begun in Maharashtra due to the second consecutive year of poor rains Agriculture minister Sharad Pawar on Wednesday said sugar output is likely to decline for the second straight year to 24 million tonnes (MT) in the year starting October 2013 due to an expected lower sugarcane crop in Maharashtra.   In 2011-12 (September-October), the country had produced 26 MT of sugar. However, the output for...

-The Indian Express Urban Development Minister Kamal Nath has said that the Delhi Development Authority will build one lakh houses for the economically weaker sections (EWS) every year. He made this announcement at a meeting of the consultative committee attached to the Ministry of Urban Development. He said around 40 lakh people in Delhi live in unauthorised colonies and to prevent further growth of slum clusters, the government regularised 917 unauthorised colonies this...

-The Times of India Get ready for a hike in autorickshaw fares. After a spate of strikes by autorickshaw unions, the Delhi Government is considering the recommendations of the committee set up to review fare hike. "The government is serious about the fare hike, especially as it has been some time since the last revision," said a source. The transport minister, Ramakant Goswami, has been holding a series of meetings with the...

-The Indian Express   The chickens have come home to roost for the UPA government and Krishna Tirath’s women and child development ministry. Tirath has to defend the bar of 18 years for consensual sex set by the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act 2012 that her ministry anchored barely a few months back. And it is the collective responsibility of the UPA government to overcome her resistance and ensure that...

-The Times of India The government is redrafting the anti-rape law following serious concerns raised by Cabinet members that the proposed legislation was loosely-worded and open to misuse, and did not account for new social realities of a growing women workforce and inadequacies of law enforcing agencies. The criminal law amendment bill was urgently referred to a group of ministers after objections were raised at Tuesday morning's Cabinet meeting over the formulation...