-The Hindu The government has declared an incentive package to encourage non-cash payments for fuel, new insurance policies from public sector firms, train tickets and highway toll, among other things. For credit and debit card transactions up to Rs.2,000, the Reserve Bank of India has relaxed its stringent two-factor authentication requirement, and service tax stands waived. Taken together, these moves to encourage cashless payments are significant not just because they can...

-The Hindu Over 350 outlets were open and instructed to hand out free food Ahead of the funeral of Chief Minister Jayalalithaa on Tuesday, Chennai shut down — shops, Restaurants and roadside eateries were closed. But as Tamil Nadu mourned her, one of Amma’s pet schemes — ‘Amma Unavagams’ (Amma Canteens) stayed open — but not for business as food was served free of cost to all those who walked in. Of the 407...

-The Hindu Centre for Politics and Public Policy Prime Minister Narendra Modi's announcement demonetising high denomination notes on November 8, 2016, will do little to address the prime objective of flushing out black money but will adversely affect the economy in the short term, especially the informal sector, which is predominant in India, says M. Govinda Rao, a Member of the Fourteenth Finance Commission and Emeritus Professor, National Institute of Public...

-The Telegraph The pundits have started to crunch numbers to assess the immediate impact of the Narendra Modi government's demonetisation drive on the economy, businesses and households - and the picture doesn't look too good. A consensus has started to emerge that the economy will take a hard knock in the short term with GDP growth likely to contract by 0.7 to 1 percentage point over the next year. The maximum impact...

-The Hindu In all the States belonging to the Hindi heartland, less than one per cent of Hindus eat beef/buffalo meat. The number of Indians eating beef and buffalo meat went up from 7.51 crore in 1999-2000 to 8.35 crore in 2011-12 while the total household consumption of beef/buffalo meat went down from 4.44 crore kg per month to 3.67 crore kg in the same time period. These findings come from National Sample...