-Press Information Bureau/ Ministry of Agriculture The Central Government has asked State Level Bankers' Committees to facilitate timely restructuring of crop loans. With restructuring, the loan repayment period would be extended. The Home Ministry has also written to states to keep 10% of SDRF fund reserved for "local disasters" such as heavy rain which are to be declared at par with national disasters and use this money for distressed farmers. This...

-Hindustan Times New Delhi: The BJP-led NDA government showed great speed in promulgating an ordinance to push through the land acquisition act, but an investigation by HT reveals that thousands of hectares of land acquired by the government is lying unused in several states. Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh top the list of states where land acquired even decades ago has not been industrialised. In the past 50 years, for instance, the...

-The Financial Express A forensic report prepared for the Serious Fraud Investigation Office (SFIO) shows over a third of India's top 500 Companies, including those in the top 100, are "managing" their accounts. It finds that Companies where promoters hold more than 50% of total shareholding are more likely to take such steps to impress markets with their performance. Both domestic Companies and subsidiaries of multinationals listed in India show similar trends...

-Tehelka Prime Minister announced increase in quantum of compensation for crop damage to affected farmers by 50 per cent. Showering a bright hope to small entrepreneur, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched MUDRA (Micro Units Development and Refinance Agency) bank under the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana which will provide credit up to 10 lakh to small entrepreneur and act as a regulator for ‘Micro-Finance Institutions' (MFIs). The prime minister also announced increase in...

-The Asian Age The much-quoted sentence, "there are three kinds of lies: lies, damn lies and statistics", was attributed to the 19th century British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli by American author Mark Twain. Although researchers could never find such a statement in any written work of Disraeli, the sentence gained universal popularity to signify how economists and other number-crunchers use the "persuasive power" of figures to make a political point or...