-ABP Live blog This is fabulous news. Perhaps the best we heard in recent times. The tiny, land-locked Himalayan State of Sikkim has become fully organic. All credit goes to Chief Minister Pawan Kumar Chamling for making that possible. It took almost 12 years to realize that dream. When Pawan Kumar Chamling made a declaration in the State assembly way back in 2003 to go completely organic, I doubt if many experts...

-The Hindu The government aims to sustain high growth and is likely to incorporate a 3-year road map. The NDA Government will present Budget 2016-17 in Parliament on February 29, Minister of State for Finance Jayant Sinha said on Thursday. The Government aims to sustain high growth and may incorporate a two-three year roadmap for economic policies, he said. “We are working hard on Budget that will be presented on February 29 and that...

-The Hindu The public now sees the Internet not just in market terms, but as a social phenomenon that requires public interest regulation. In its aggressive campaign for Free Basics, couched in simplistic developmental language, Facebook underestimated the political sophistication of the Indian public. It must be regretting it now. The social networking service’s reportedly Rs. 100-crore campaign, through double full-page newspaper advertisements, billboards and television, appears simply to have congealed public...

Representatives of around 20 civil society organizations and NGOs met the Finance Minister Shri Arun Jaitley as part of pre-budget consultation on social sector on 12 January, 2016. Immediately after the pre-budget consultation, a press conference was held by some of these organizations to convey the media persons what demands/ suggestions were made.   Subrat Das, Executive Director of Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability (CBGA, http://www.cbgaindia.org/) informed us that during...

-Business Standard Despite two consecutive years of deficient rains, farm growth was positive in Q2 of 2015-16 The India Meteorological Department (IMD) might have decided to drop the use of the word “drought” from its nomenclature, but even if it had not done so, it would have hardly made a difference. Studies show that Indian agriculture has, over the years, developed an inherent resistance to drought. The share of agriculture in the overall...