-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Contrary to the perception that the UPA government has been spending more on social sector schemes, a financial Audit of the Union government's accounts for 2011-12, tabled in Parliament on Tuesday, reveals that every year, the spending has been coming down drastically on most of the major flagship programmes - by up to 63% in some cases. The largest allocation in the Budget in the last...

-Outlook The Comptroller and Auditor General has slammed Railways for not effectively implementing Railway Board's guidelines for mechanised cleaning of major stations and not taking effective pest control measures in coaches. Besides the Audit body has observed that Railways has failed to provide good quality of linen to passengers which has resulted in increased passenger dissatisfaction. "There was lack of synchronisation between guidelines of Railway Ministry on maintenance of cleanliness and availability of...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: With CAG reports on 2G and Coalgate scams hounding the UPA-2 regime, Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia on Monday said the federal Auditor was not equipped to carry out performance evaluation. While the UPA had targeted CAG for "exceeding its jurisdiction" by venturing into policy domain, Ahluwalia took the fight to another level by arguing that the performance Audit carried out by the Auditor...

-The Hindu Unlike many countries that have passed laws to protect citizens' privacy, the Indian state is collecting more and more information about private individuals under various pretexts and restricting their right to access their own information Does a serving employee of a premier intelligence agency have the right to inspect his own biodata which that agency handed over to another public authority? Then again, does a former employee of that agency...

-The Hindu New Delhi: It was to meet the commuting needs of the differently-abled, like Nitin (name changed) who is a wheel-chair user and resides in Vikaspuri in West Delhi, that low floor buses in Delhi were specially designed by a team of IIT-Delhi, Tata Motors and NGO Samarthyam. But with their drivers and conductors often not bothering to stop for the disabled and those in need of assistance, the entire...