-The Business Standard Demands CBI inquiry into Rs 2.4 crore road construction scam Union Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh has scolded the Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party government in Uttar Pradesh over an alleged Rs 2.4 crore fund embezzlement under the Pradhan Mantri Grameen Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) in the state. He has asked for an inquiry by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). The issue pertains to construction of five Roads in Sultanpur district,...

-The Telegraph The National Highways Authority of India has accused the Planning Commission of "inconsistencies in stand", saying they are creating confusion and delaying decisions on its projects. NHAI chairperson R.P. Singh has quoted instances - in a letter to commission member B.K. Chaturvedi - where the Planning Commission had taken a diametrically opposite stand from its earlier position that investors should be allowed to exit from finished projects rather than wait...

-The Hindu   The water markets of Marathwada are booming. In the town of Jalna alone, tanker owners transact between Rs.6 million and Rs.7.5 million in water sales each day Thirst is Marathwada's greatest crop this season. Forget sugarcane. Thirst, human and industrial, eclipses anything else. Those harvesting it reap tens of millions of rupees each day across the region. The van loads of dried-out cane you see on the Roads could end...

-The Times of India MUMBAI: Indian villages are powering their own economy, but contrary to conventional belief , it's not government largesses which are the drivers, but their own self-sustaining models. Growth at the bottom of the pyramid is at unprecedented level, and the transformation is stark. The factors driving this transformation are dramatic improvements in rural Roads, electrification, cell phones and water supply which are raising wages and increasing job opportunities...

-The Hindu MADPAL (SOUTH CHHATTISGARH): The Chhattisgarh police have killed two activists of the Salwa Judum, a government-backed militia to take on Naxalites, which the Supreme Court declared illegal and unconstitutional. A couple of eyewitnesses told The Hindu that the villagers, of the Muria Gond tribe, were "killed in cold blood by the police." A magisterial inquiry has been ordered into the incident, which has angered the residents of several villages in Bijapur...