-Live Mint Attempt to broad-base direct benefits transfer plan may help shore up the Congress’s standing among rural population The Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government plans to include its flagship rural job guarantee programme in the second phase of its ambitious direct benefits transfer (DBT) plan, under which beneficiaries of social welfare programmes will receive money directly in their Aadhaar-linked bank accounts. The attempt to broad-base the cash transfer plan before several...

-The Indian Express The coal ministry is likely to tell the Supreme Court that allocations made through the screening committee route were "unimpeachable and unquestionable". A day after the Supreme Court rapped the government saying all coal blocks allocated during 2006-09 can be summarily de-allocated if breach of procedures in the defined allocation process is established, coal ministry officials are sure they can defend the policy. They aim to include the comments of...

-The Times of India Retail inflation soared in February on the back of stubborn food prices sustaining pressure on consumers and complicating the policy choice for the central bank. Data released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) on Tuesday showed the inflation rate based on all-India general CPI ( consumer price index) for February was 10.91% compared to 10.79% for the previous month. The inflation rates for rural and urban areas for...

-Outlook Lucknow: World Bank Group President Jim Young Kim today said the mission of the multilateral institution was to end poverty, and there is no way in achieving this objective for the country without ending it in Uttar Pradesh. "We have called on two fundamental ideas one is end to poverty... In this generation, we think that we can end the poverty," Kim said in a joint press conference with Chief Minister...

-Pragoti The magnificent victory of the CPI(M)-led Left Front in Tripura - winning 50 out of the 60 seats – and the success of the LF candidate in the Nalhati by-election in West Bengal has been interpreted as a “re-emergence” of the Left parties by a senior CPI(M) leader. This does not seem to be a rigorous assessment. While the fifth consecutive win by the LF in Tripura is a matter of...