-The Times of India The Planning Commission may drop reference to crony capitalism in the plan document after protests from some ministers who are of the view that any mention would be a tacit acknowledgment of the existence of the practice. Besides, it has suggested "transparent auction" of natural resources as the solution, something that the government is not willing to accept as the one-size-fits-all approach for all sectors. Apart from crony capitalism,...

-The Economic Times "Are we knowledge-proof?" asked the late Prof Raj Krishna. As memorable as his other coinage, the Hindu rate of growth, this question is relevant, given our current growth strategy. The SME sector is a vibrant part of the economy, accounting for 40% of manufacturing and generating jobson a scale second only to agriculture. The figures are similarly significant for handicrafts and handlooms. According to the Tenth Plan, GDP from handicrafts...

-The Hindu Building ‘capitalism with Indian characteristics’ means decisions cannot ignore concerns of voters and communities As the economy slows down and the rupee wilts, Manmohan Singh has bitten the ‘reforms’ bullet with both eyes on the credit rating agencies whose negative reports have done much to dampen the ‘animal spirits’ of investors, foreign and native. Last November, when the Congress party made a push to introduce foreign direct investment in multi-brand retail,...

-The Indian Express Mining in India has come a long way in the last 50 years or so. From the Industrial Policy Resolution of 1957 to the National Mineral Policy (NMP) of 1993, and now to the NMP of 2008, it has shown a progressive shift towards bringing the private sector into exploration, mining and downstream value addition. However, the regulatory systems perhaps never managed to keep pace with developments on...

-Outlook The government has approved the National Policy on Information Technology, which aims to make at least one individual in every household e-literate among other objectives, DEITy Secretary J Satyanarayana said today. "The IT policy has been cleared by the Government of India recently and the Policy addresses a number of issues regarding the development of the ICT sector and using it for the growth of the country, not only from the...