-The Times of India With award of highway projects slowing down due to bad market sentiment, the government is banking on rolling out about 3,000-4,000 km highway projects with 100% financial support.  The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), which has identified these stretches, is likely to spend about Rs 15,000-Rs 20,000 crore (including land acquisition expenses) in the next two years.  Industry insiders said that this could save the day for the...

-The Telegraph The Maharashtra government today cleared a proposal to ban the manufacture, storage, distribution and sale of gutkha and paan masala. The state has become the fourth, after Kerala, Madhya Pradesh and Bihar, to impose such curbs. The decision was taken at a CABinet meeting presided over by chief minister Prithviraj Chavan this evening, sources said. But there was no announcement as the Assembly’s monsoon session is on. It could be done...

-The Telegraph Shillong: Meghalaya police, along with the South Garo Hills district administration, have mounted rescue operations to try and save 15 labourers trapped inside a coal mine close to Nangalbibra since last week. According to information received from South Garo Hills, 15 labourers are still trapped inside the mine at Nengkol in the Rongsa Awe area of Nangalbibra region since Friday afternoon. The chances of their survival appear grim. Baghmara, the district...

-The Deccan Chronicle Following the age old practice of trying to circumvent the law, schools which did not enjoy a minority status, have begun vying for it to avoid admitting poor students under the Right to Education (RTE) Act. Sensing trouble, the state government has come up with a strategy of its own to defeat them at their own game. Much to the horror of the institutions concerned, it announced after...

ASHAs will continue to bear the burden of the government's rural health mission as a new order lists more incentive-based services. On May 31, a Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare order listed additional incentivised duties for accredited social health activists, or ASHAs, but was silent on the issue of regularisation of their employment. ASHAs, who bridge the gap between the rural population and the nearest health care outlets under...