-Business Standard Private weather forecast agency revises estimate to 109% of LPA As the country awaits the arrival of the southwest monsoon after two years of drought, private weather forecasting agency Skymet on Tuesday revised upward its 2016 southwest monsoon forecast to 109 per cent of the long period average (LPA) from 105 predicted in April. The forecast, if accurate, would mean that India might have its highest southwest monsoon since 1994 and...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The government has decided to make it a must for all public buses owned by state transport corporations to have emergency panic buttons, surveillance cameras and vehicle-tracking devices to ensure the safety of women passengers. A formal notification on the rules will be issued after June 2, Union road transport and highways minister Nitin Gadkari said in the capital today. The minister made the announcement while launching a pilot...

-The Financial Express Dismantling cane economy will not be painless, shift crop to drip irrigation Opinion-makers, from agricultural economists and academics to environmentalists, have blamed sugarcane for aggravating the water shortage in Marathwada. But the view is contested. ‘I reject the hypothesis,’ says Venkat Mayande, during a conversation in Pune. Mayande was vice-chancellor of Akola’s Panjabrao Deshmukh Agricultural University till 2012. How can 2.1 lakh hectare (ha) of cane cause a shortage of...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Centre on Wednesday virtually rejected Chief Justice of India TS Thakur's claim that 40,000 more judges were needed to obliterate over THRee crore pending cases by saying that his estimates were not backed by any scientific research or data. Referring to 1987 Law Commission report suggesting increase in judges' strength, the CJI had on May 8 said the judiciary needed an additional 40,000 Judges to...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: In its over-zealousness to protect the lives of citizens reeling under severe drought in several states, the Supreme Court has erred in directing the Centre to set up a National Disaster Mitigation Fund (NDMF) under a non-operational statutory provision, which had riled the government. Led by finance minister Arun Jaitley, the government had accused the judiciary of wanton interference in the executive's exclusive domain of earmarking...