-The Economic Times NEW DELHI: The government's ambitious manufacturing thrust has run into trouble even before it could take off with many states expressing difficulty in acquiring the vast tracts of land needed to set up dedicated zones. Five states have written to the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion, requesting it to consider revising the minimum land requirement (from existing 5,000 hectare) for developing National Manufacturing Investment Zones (NMIZs). These include Assam,...

-Frontline Corruption tends to be greater in periods when there is a state-engineered redistribution of wealth in favour of a few at the explicit or implicit expense of the many. Liberalisation is one such period. IT cannot be verified and may not be true. But, the view that the record of graft and corruption during the two-term, nine-year rule of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) is the worst in India's post-Independence...

-The Economic Times Three weeks ago, when the Supreme Court reopened the iron-ore mining door some more in Karnataka, miners in Orissa breathed a Rs 50,000 crore sigh of relief. Also in the dock for some offences of a similar nature, Orissa's iron-ore miners, who produce a third of this mineral that is critical to steel, had been dreading their fate, which lay in the hands of a Central government panel. The...

-The Hindu India's hard won gains in achieving food security are in danger of being undermined by a clause in the National Food Security Bill that encourages States to adopt cash transfers in lieu of food entitlements under the Public Distribution System (PDS). Supporting this view, a recent report by the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices (CACP) concluded that the provision of food subsidies in the form of cash would...

-The United Nations An estimated 73 million young people will be out of work this year, according to a new United Nations report that says the long-term impact of the youth employment crisis could be felt for decades and calls for creative and wide-ranging policy solutions to address the problem. Global Employment Trends for Youth 2013: A generation at risk attributes that high number to persistent unemployment, a proliferation of temporary jobs...