-The Times of India It was meant to showcase the government's new-found resolve to push the reforms agenda in order to stanch the declining growth rate and to repulse the perception of governance freeze. Instead, it ended up publicizing yet again the government's vulnerability as well as its reluctance to speed up decision making at the cost of angering allies on the eve of presidential poll.  The UPA on Thursday withdrew its...

-The New York Times India's coalition government just celebrated the third anniversary of its tenure with a self-congratulatory banquet that could not have been more poorly timed: India's currency, the rupee, is falling; investment is down; inflation is rising; and deficits are eating away at government coffers. While short-term growth has slowed but not ground to a halt, India's problems have dampened hopes that it, along with China and other non-Western economies,...

-The Economic Times The story of rotting foodgrains and hunger rocked the Lok Sabha yet again on Wednesday morning, prompting the government to say it was ready for consultations with political parties to find a long-term solution to the problem of storage facilities. Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee gave this assurance when an angry Opposition sought greater availability of jute sacks for wheat before the monsoon. BJP and its ally JD(U) have been...

West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday threatened to bring her anger to the streets of New Delhi and launch an agitation in the capital if the Centre didn't give in to her demand for a moratorium on debt repayment. In a rare and exclusive interview to TOI at the Writers' Buildings in Kolkata, the Trinamool Congress chief didn't once utter the words "threat" or "pullout", but her message was...

-The Economist West Bengal’s populist chief minister is doing badly. Yet she typifies shifts in power in India BUYER’S remorse is common enough in the dusty markets of Kolkata, a delightful if crumbling great city, once known as Calcutta and still capital of the state of West Bengal. Those who buy cheap plastic goods or plaster-of-Paris busts of Rabindranath Tagore, Bengal’s cultural hero, may come to regret their haste. Likewise, many who...