-The Indian Express New Delhi: At least 33 private hospitals in Delhi have been sent letters for recovery of retrospective penalty - from the time land was allotted to them - for not meeting norms related to free treatment of the economically weaker section and for amassing "unwarranted profits". The letters have been sent by the Delhi government which hopes to recover more than Rs 1,500 crore in penalty from these hospitals....

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The National Commission for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes has ordered the Uttar Pradesh government to pay Rs 1 lakh as compensation to the family of a tribal maidservant from Jharkhand, whose body was found hanging at her employer's Kaushambi home in Ghaziabad this June. The commission issued this directive after a detailed hearing of the case in which senior officials of Jharkhand state anti-trafficking unit and UP...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Left-wing extremism, which afflicts several states, has killed a whopping 14,689 people, including 11,742 civilians and 2,947 security personnel, since 1980. However, the 4,638 fatal casualties on the Naxalites' side were just one-third of the killings carried out by them over the last three decades. The silver lining, however, is that the trends of Naxal violence are showing a steady decline in killings since 2010. As many...

-The Hindu     Realising that New Delhi needs to clear its food security legislation at the WTO in time for the election, the West has sought increased market access in return for temporary relief A few months ago, the most optimistic observers of international politics were not willing to hedge their bets on the Doha Development Round at the World Trade Organisation. The Doha Round negotiations have been stalled for more than a...

-IANS A small sugarcane farmer in western Maharashtra, Bhau Kadam (name changed) and his family, own about three hectares of land. He has two sons who are both graduates and work in Pune. When I asked him why he did not make his sons farmers, he says that farming is hard work, is non-remunerative and it is difficult to get labour. Besides he also thinks that farming is not glamorous, a farmer's...