-The Hindu Business Line MUMBAI: The government on Monday constituted a standing committee headed by Niti Aayog to oversee the drug pricing regime, a move which could clip the powers of drug pricing regulator, National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA). The Standing Committee on Affordable Medicines and Health Products will be headed by NITI Aayog member (health), and includes chief economic adviser, besides secretary department of health research, director general of health...

-Down to Earth Sunita Narain on cow-vigilantism, cattle trade and the collapse of the livestock economy of India I would not advocate vegetarianism. When I reasoned this out in this column a few years ago, I received the usual insults. Environmentalists are expected to be vegetarian, or better vegan! But what many didn’t register was my emphasis: “I am saying this as an Indian environmentalist; not global or western environmentalist.” My argument has...

-The Hindu Business Line The new series data cannot really be faulted. But it is important not to repeat the policy mistakes that hit industrial growth The 2011-12 base backdated GDP series led to much discussion. The reduction in past growth rates gave them a political colour. It is unfortunate if the independence of the CSO and associated experts is questioned just because of this coincidence. A rebasing that uses much richer...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The health ministry was actively mulling compulsory licensing, apart from price capping, of “orphan drugs” (for rare diseases), when the department of pharmaceuticals abruptly issued an order exempting such medicines from price control, derailing plans to make these drugs affordable. The health ministry discussed price capping and invoking compulsory licence for these “exorbitantly” priced “orphan drugs” at a meeting on January 3, the day when DoP...

-Livemint.com Taking a cue from election results, political parties may announce more farm loan waivers but this will do little to fix the persistent distress in rural households The drubbing of the Narendra Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the state elections in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh has proved beyond doubt that all isn’t well in India’s hinterland. An analysis of the poll results in these three states show that the...