-PTI NEW DELHI: The government today launched three agri-portals to make the process of organic farming certification, fertilisers' quality checking and issuance of soil health cards, more transparent and accountable. These portals, launched only in English, will be made available in regional languages also in the next phase for the benefit of farmers. "The three agricultural portals will bring more transparency and accountability. This will help the farming community," Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan...

-Business Standard This could help bypass central legislation and break the land Bill deadlock Ten big states, most of those ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its alliance partners, on Wednesday sought to unshackle themselves from the logjam over amendments to the contentious land acquisition Bill, 2013, by proposing to bring their own laws for boosting infrastructure development. At a NITI Aayog meeting to discuss the land Bill (the Right to...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Manik Garg, second-year commerce student at Shri Ram College of Commerce, knows nearly as much about cattle and dairy-farming as he does about business. He knows, for instance, that there are three types of feed ("Green fodder, hay and high-nutrition feed"), that a high-yielding animal (delivering at least 15 litres of milk per day) costs Rs 60,000—70,000 and that some pedigreed bovines need air-conditioned rooms. He,...

-Reuters NEW DELHI: A leading global charity has frozen $4 million in funding to India, squeezing aid to the poor, after a clampdown by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on donors deemed to be meddling in domestic politics that has raised concern in Washington. The government restrictions on the US-based Ford Foundation relate to a $250,000 grant to a vocal Modi critic, but a top official at the charity said the fallout has...

-The Economic Times Nobody has ever accused former Bihar chief minister Lalu Prasad Yadav of number crunching. All his life he has milked cows and caste without ever needing to count. Yet, he is all set to lead a protest march in Patna on July 13 seeking the publication of caste data in the socio-economic caste census. If the other big Yadav chieftain, Mulayam Singh Yadav, rakes it up in Uttar...