-Hindustan Times A little over a 100 kms south from the city of Ahmedabad, in the lush green cotton fields, speckled with creamy white cotton buds, locals will regale you with stories of farmers who sold their land and got rich. There is one about a few farmers in a nearby village, who sold their land to a corporate and bought the “chaar bangle waali car” (referring to the Audi logo)....

-The Hindu When the going gets tough, public investment must be stepped up to pump-prime a slow-moving economy facing uncertain headwinds of low commodity prices and faltering international trade. When the going is good, the private sector would also have a role to play, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has said, vowing to ramp up infrastructure investments in 2016-17. Ten months ago, in his first Budget for a full financial year, Mr....

-The Hindu For growth to go forward, it must be environmentally and socially concordant. The launch of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and agreements in Paris finally signalled the realisation that we can no longer achieve our economic ambitions by endangering the environment and society. But even as countries agreed on the need to nurture sustainability, it has come under fire from the mistaken notion that doing so will slow the pace...

-Business Standard Investments in the health sector are far lower than those in the transport and energy sectors Of the 4,000-odd multi-crore infrastructure projects in the country, only nine (0.21%) - with a total investment of Rs 938 crore - are in the health sector, according to data published by the finance ministry. The public-private partnership (PPP) projects range from diagnostic centres to super-specialty hospitals. Investments in the health sector are far lower...

-Hindustan Times The Chennai floods have thrown up some fundamental flaws in our system of urban planning. Across India, city after city has experienced floods, while some others live with the fear of impending disasters. In Mumbai, flooding was caused by wrong developments at the Bandra estuary and negligence along the Mithi river, and in Uttarakhand the disaster was caused by unplanned regional development and the unholy nexus between the land...