-Down to Earth Expresses concern over alcohol brands being advertised in violation of rules India is emerging as the favourite destination for alcohol promotion of marketing companies. Their new targets are women and youth, who at present comprise a very small percentage of alcohol consumers in India. These are the observations made by a report-Alcohol Marketing and Regulatory Policy Environment in India-put out by the Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI). It...

-The Business Standard The National Optic Fibre Network project aims to connect 2.5 lakh gram panchayats across the country with optical fibre The government is likely to miss the deadline for its dream project - National Optic Fibre Network (NOFN) to connect 2.5 lakh gram panchayats across the country with optical fibre for offering 100 megabit per second (mbps) broadband services. The much-talked-about NOFN project, which was initiated in 2011 with the approval...

-The World Bank   Policy Interventions Can Turn the Tide, Says World Bank Report WASHINGTON: A new World Bank report warns that risky behaviors -smoking, using illicit drugs, alcohol abuse, unhealthy diets, and unsafe sex- are increasing globally and pose a growing threat to the health of individuals, particularly in developing countries. The report looks at how individual choices that lead to these behaviors are formed and reviews the effectiveness of interventions...

-The Indian Express For the Bharatiya Mahila Bank, the country's first pan-India national women's bank, it is a humble rural cooperative women's venture in Maharashtra that has provided the critical input to succeed: How to lend to women who do not have collateral to back their loans. Chetna V Sinha, founder and chairperson of Mann Deshi Mahila Sahakari Bank, explained that this is the prime weakness in giving loans to women. The...

-PTI Soaring inflation, high fuel cost, rising cost of education and health insurance premiums have eroded the real incomes of middle-class Indian families, with household savings rates dropping by a staggering 40 per cent in the last three years, says an Assocham survey. "Poor households are unable to maintain the Consumption levels at current prices while middle income families find their purchasing power erode fast, thus having far less surplus money," Assocham...