-The Telegraph Calcutta: Mamata Banerjee was staring at her darkest night in power after the chief minister shunted out police commissioner R.K. Pachnanda for ignoring the ruling party’s diktats and earned a damning rebuke from the governor. A crackdown that netted several Trinamul supporters and brought the police within striking distance of bigger fish during investigations into the murder of sub-inspector Tapas Chowdhury was said to be the immediate trigger for the...

-The Economic Times Cash Transfer in various forms has been used in many countries to target support to the poor and achieve social objectives. In India, its introduction has generated more passion than rational debate. The scheme is not a magic bullet, but if properly implemented and targeted, cash Transfer is a very sensible instrument of social assistance. In India, the rationale for introducing the scheme seems to be to check...

-Live Mint The project is part of the country’s ambitious cash-Transfer plan for selected welfare programmes Bangalore: Karnataka will start Transferring cash directly to the bank accounts of the beneficiaries of India’s rural job guarantee scheme on a pilot basis in seven districts later this year, the state government said. This is part of the country’s ambitious cash-Transfer plan for selected welfare programmes that the central government wants to eventually adopt across the...

-The Times of India More than five months after the CBI began investigating Coalgate, the agency is yet to receive hundreds of files from the coal ministry as it probes charges of criminality in allocation of coal blocks to private players. Although CBI has been sifting through an enormous mass of information regarding coal block allocations that the CAG has said caused a loss of Rs 1.86 lakh crore to the government,...

-The Hindu Soni Sori, the tribal accused of acting as a courier between Essar Steel and the outlawed Communist Party of India (Maoist), has been acquitted in a crucial case filed in 2010 by the Dantewada district police against 19 individuals for allegedly opening fire and using explosives to blow vehicles of Essar. Ms Sori was one of the key accused in the case. “But the additional sessions court of Anita Dehariya could not find...