The commerce ministry will announce rules to simplify and rationalize procedures to revive special economic zones, hoping to draw investors to these enclaves once touted as centres of export excellence.  The changes, which will be notified in a week, could include a reduction the minimum-area requirement, easier vacancy and contiguity norms and allowing multi-product SEZs in sector-specific zones.  "There will be reforms and changes in policies pertaining to SEZs mainly to simplify...

-The Telegraph   The National Skill Development Corporation today said youths of the region need to be given the opportunity to develop skills for employment to stop migration in search of jobs. At a conclave on skill development in the Northeast here today, the corporation pointed out that between 2011 and 2021 over 14 million people would be potentially available for migration. The region will generate employment for 2.6 million persons while the supply...

As many as 68 families who lost relatives in the AMRI Dhakuria fire met at the Nandan complex this morning to raise safety awareness but some were unable to mask the anger at police’s inability to arrest anyone on duty that night. “I still can’t forget how the security personnel kept insisting that the smoke could never enter the ICU, where my father was. He was a cardiac patient and his...

The government, the largest owner of landed property in the country, is preparing a comprehensive land sale policy to raise revenues and check corruption in government-owned property deals. The finance ministry will shortly move a cabinet note for BRInging in a new uniform policy on 'land alienation' by government agencies, with an eye on removing discretionary powers of individual ministers and bureaucrats, said a government official. In big cities, large tracts...

-The Hindu   “The intent is clear. Keep the people drugged so they do not revolt against poverty” Press Council of India (PCI) Chairman Justice Markandey Katju on Sunday called upon journalists to play a seminal role in promoting scientific and rational ideas in society and raise the intellectual level of the masses by extricating them from the morass of superstition, casteism, bigotry, communalism and feudal tendencies. Delivering the Jhabarmal Sharma memorial lecture here,...