-PTI NEW DELHI: Amid expectations of normal rain, the government today approved a hike of Rs 60 in paddy support price (MSP) to Rs 1,310 per quintal in order to encourage farmers to grow more in the ongoing kharif season. The government also increased the minimum support price (MSP) of pulses and oilseeds by up to Rs 450 and Rs 320 per quintal, to boost ouput and reduce import dependence. "The Cabinet Committee...

-The Hindu     Shonali Muthalaly and Anusha Parthasarathy join the queue at an Amma Unavagam in the city and sample the fare as early as seven in the morning We are in the queue at 6.30 a.m. That's if you can call this a queue. Three people stand around sleepily. So much for our mental image of waiting in a hungry Oliver Twist-like queue for idlis! Two more people saunter into the Alwarpet...

-Outlook As the Manmohan Singh government makes evident its unfriendliness to villages, the nation hurtles towards disaster. It's a danger no one wants to face. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been trying for years to make us believe that agriculture is a vast marshland in which a huge population is stuck ankle- to neck-deep and it is his duty to rescue them. "Our salvation lies in moving people out of agriculture," he...

-IANS Those who cherish India's constitutional values will find Gujarat Chief Minister Narenda Modi's boast to build a state of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel (India's first home minister and deputy prime minister) taller than the Statue of Liberty rather chilling. By prizing nationalism over individual freedom, Modi may have once again revealed his illiberal nature. People who dislike this aspect of him, Leftists mainly, give vent to their disapproval by dismissing Modi's development...

-The Hindustan Times The audacious ambush and bloody massacre of more than two dozen political leaders and their security guards in Darbha valley of Sukma district in south Chhattisgarh, raises again profoundly important questions about the legitimacy of violence as an instrument to battle injustice and oppression. Resistance to injustice is widely endorsed as the highest human duty in most cultures, but the debate is about the legitimacy of deploying violence in...