The Left Front has started mobilising the support of non-NDA and non-UPA parties to garner support against the Congress-led UPA government's move to push its economic reforms agenda with three much-delayed financial sector legislations. The Left Front will reach out to regional parties, including AIADMK, Samajwadi Party, Janata Dal (Secular), Biju Janata Dal and Asom Gana Parishad, to gather numbers against the legislations. Despite reservations expressed by UPA ally Trinamool Congress,...

-The Hindu ‘But cumbersome anti-graft apparatus can delay decisions'   With a slew of scams vitiating the government's policy-making environment and holding up reforms, the Economic Survey 2011-12 on Thursday advocated need for a ruthless crackdown on corruption, but cautioned that a large and cumbersome anti-corruption bureaucracy could impact decision-making. “While we need to ruthlessly crack down on corruption, it must, at the same time, be recognised that the fear of a large and...

-The Economic Times The government may be forced to trim its legislative agenda - including pushing through long-pending bills on pensions, insurance and banking - following Congress' debacle in Uttar Pradesh and Punjab assembly elections.  Pension, insurance and banking sector reforms are part of the legislative agenda of the UPA government but BJP leaders told finance minister Pranab Mukherjee at an outreach session that the government should first set its House in...

-The Economic Times Small and marginal farmers who constitute more than 80% of total farmer households in the country face exclusion from formal financial channels," says the Nair Committee on priority sector lending. The same report says "commercial banks have been prescribed targets since late 1960s for priority sector lending".  The banking system failed the farmers and the needy despite nationalisation, but is there a viable model that could help the millions...

-Reuters The Congress party trailed in fourth place as vote counting neared its end in Uttar Pradesh on Tuesday, a bitter election blow to Rahul Gandhi who had staked his political future on reviving his party's fortunes in the state. Gandhi, scion of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty that ruled India for most of its 65 years of independence, had campaigned tirelessly to revive his party in the politically crucial state where it has...