-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The EPFO (Employees' Provident Fund Organization), which manages lifetime savings of 6.15 crore individuals, has just made life tougher for workers. Employees will now have to prove that their employers deducted the statutory dues while giving them salaries, a move that will further benefit construction companies and contractors in particular who often claim that they have paid salaries to thousands of workers without actually transferring...

-The New York Times ASHULIA, BANGLADESH: The fire alarm shattered the monotony of the Tazreen Fashions factory. Hundreds of seamstresses looked up from their machines, startled. On the third floor, Shima Akhter Pakhi had been stitching hoods onto fleece jackets. Now she ran to a staircase. But two managers were blocking the way. Ignore the alarm, they ordered. It was just a test. Back to work. A few women laughed nervously. Ms....

-Reuters MUMBAI: Wal-Mart Stores Inc prepared its entry into India's supermarket sector in 2010 with a $100 million investment into a consultancy with no Employees, no profits and a scant $14,000 in revenue. The company, called Cedar Support Services, might have been a more obvious selection four months earlier: it began its corporate life as Bharti Retail Holdings Ltd, according to documents filed with India's Registrar of Companies. The Cedar investment is now...

-The Indian Express Rupnarayanpur: Located nearly 130 km from Singur, the Tatas claim to have scripted a success story in Rupnarayanpur. While the Singur factory continues to be at the centre of a controversy, the Tata-Hitachi JV here on a 250 acre land acquired from farmers is setting milestones. The Tatas ventured into this project almost the same time as that in Singur. The company commenced production in 2009. It has a...

-Tehelka Here are the gaping holes in the argument for FDI in retail. No smooth talk can pave over it TOUTED AS a cure-all for India’s economic ills, Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in multi-brand retail is at best an anodyne, and at worst, toxic. It is an attempt to lift markets by fabricating sentiment; signalling an economic turnaround without any concrete steps being taken to trim the fiscal deficit or boost manufacturing. All...