A six-phased Assembly elections in West Bengal, a two stage poll in Assam and a single day poll in Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Puducherry were today announced by the Election Commission, setting in motion the largest such exercise after 2009 Lok Sabha polls. With parts of the state affected by Maoists activities, West Bengal will have elections in six phases on April 18, 23, 27, May 3, 7 and 10,...

In an attempt to deal with the use of black money in elections, the maximum poll expenditure for parliamentary constituencies has been increased to Rs 40 lakh and to Rs 16 lakh for assembly constituencies. Expenditure limit varies according to the size of states. On Wednesday, law ministry issued a notification amending the Conduct of Election Rules. At present, in big states, the upper spending limit in parliamentary constituency is Rs...

Haryana has distributed Rs 9,834.73 crore from March 2005 to March 2010 to the farmers for the land acquired by Haryana Urban Development Authority (16,362 acre), Haryana State Infrastructure and Industrial Development Corporation (19,868 acre), Public Works Department - Building and Roads (386 acre) and Irrigation department (6,618 acre). Talking to media, Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda said, the average compensation comes to be Rs 22,74,000 per acre that...

Peasant leader and RTI activist Akhil Gogoi, who is spearheading an anti-corruption campaign in the state almost single-handedly, will move the Election Commission with details of property owned by ministers and their families ahead of the forthcoming Assembly elections. Gogoi today said the recent asset lists made public by some of the ministers revealed only a small portion of their assets, scattered across different parts of the state. “Using the RTI Act,...

Kerala, Punjab, Tamil Nadu high on HDI: study In a study done by Abusaleh Shariff, chief economist at the National Council for Applied Economic Research (NCAER), Gujarat surprisingly emerges as a State with high levels of hunger, while simultaneously boasting high per capita income and consistent income stability. The hunger levels in Gujarat are higher than in Tamil Nadu and West Bengal, and surprisingly even higher than in Uttar Pradesh, according to...