-The Times of India   The state government on Monday took yet another step forward in ensuring smooth land acquisition for the mega Posco steel plant in Jagatsinghpur, assuring to fulfil certain demands of a pro-industry outfit having considerable clout in the project area. At a meeting in Cuttack, the revenue divisional commissioner (central range) Pradipta Mohapatra assured representatives of the United Action Committee (UAC) that the government would consider fulfiling...

The Centre could bring in a mechanism to stop entities from acquiring land beyond the project requirement, a practice which is at the heart of corruption and anger among landowners as seen in western UP. An amendment to the Land Acquisition Act could cap the maximum land to be acquired for different categories of projects or could install a process to check the feasibility of the demand for land. Acquisitions...

-The Times of India   The Allahabad high court on Monday scrapped the acquisition of 170 hectares of land in Gulistanpur village of Gautam Budh Nagar in Greater Noida. The bench of Justice Sunil Ambwani and Justice K N Pandey quashed a UP government notification citing the urgency clause for planned industrial development in Gulistanpur village. This is the third time this month that the high court has cancelled land acquisitions...

-The Hindu   Human rights activist Binayak Sen said here on Monday that there was no question of his being a Naxal sympathiser. “Neither am I a Naxal sympathiser nor [an] opposer of Naxals,” Dr. Sen told journalists at the Press Club. “I believe that violence, either of the state or the non-state actors, does not cure any problem,” he said. Launching a scathing attack on Salwa Judum, he said that it...

-The Business Standard The Jagatsinghpur district administration has decided to serve notice within next couple of days on the villagers of Polang, Bhuyianpal and Noliasahi who have not demolished their betel vines to clear the obstacle at the proposed Posco site for sand leveling and construction of boundary wall for the project. Sources said many villagers of Polang, Gadkujang, Noliasahi, Bhuiyanpal, Bayanalkanda and Nuagaon, who have been identified as anti-Posco activists, have...