-The Times of India MUMBAI: Consumers can look forward to a reduction in prices of essential medicines, with the Sharad Pawar-led Group of Ministers (GoM) planning to take a final decision on the pharmaceutical policy soon. The GoM will meet on September 27 to examine options under the market price-based mechanism to cap prices of drugs, which may lead to a reduction ranging from 25% to even 90% in some cases,...

-The Indian Express A group of teachers at Jamia Milia Islamia University has put together a compilation of terror cases that failed to hold up in court, all of these built by the Delhi Police Special Cell around youths they had arrested and described as terrorists. Titled “Framed, Damned and Acquitted: Dossiers of a Very Special Cell” and compiled from court judgments and media reports, the study by the Jamia Teachers’ Solidarity...

-Economic and Political Weekly  The Government of India is considering a proposal to notify farming as an essential service. This is ostensibly to bring drought relief to farmers suffering from a weak monsoon - a laudable goal indeed. However, if farming is deemed an "essential service", farmers and farm workers could lose many of their political and civic rights because the government can then invoke the Essential Services Maintenance Act to...

-The Hindustan Times Environment ministry will set up an expert committee to find out the mining companies, including in coal sector, who have failed to start mining despite getting environment clearances and to strengthen the ministry's monitoring process. The ministry has given environment clearance to 530 million tonnes to coal but operations to mine only 200 million has started. Many companies have failed to start mining despite getting the clearance years ago. There is...

-PTI Bombay High Court today upheld the ban on gutkha and pan masala in Maharashtra. The court, hearing pleas filed by gutkha and pan masala makers, said the tobacco flavoured products fell within the definition of “food” and hence the commissioner of Food and Drugs Administration has the power to ban them. A division bench of Chief Justice Mohit Shah and Justice Nitin Jamdar ordered the state government not to destroy the seized...