-The Telegraph New Delhi: The leader of the Congress in the Lok Sabha, Mallikarjun Kharge, refused to attend a selection committee meeting on the Lokpal on Thursday, accusing the government of reducing a "scared procedure" to a "political pretence". In a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Kharge pointed out that he was invited to the meeting as a mere "special invitee" who would have no say in the selection. "The conduct of...

-Livemint.com The strategy for doubling farmer incomes will differ from state to state, and from one region to another even within a state After two consecutive years of drought, in 2014-15 and 2015-16, farmers of many crops were hit by low market prices in several states in 2016-17. In view of widespread discontent, there is a sense of urgency about addressing their issues. Therefore, the conference organized by the ministry of agriculture...

-Frontline.in Despite its deeply flawed neoliberal perspective, Economic Survey 2017-18 is rich in detail, has many useful analytical discussions at different levels of aggregation, and would serve as a useful resource for students and scholars. When ARVind Subramanian, the present Chief Economic Adviser to the Ministry of Finance who took office way back in October 2014, presented his first Economic Survey, the one for 2014-15, there was considerable novelty on offer, at...

-Outlook A break-up of the expenses suggests that an average of Rs 22,000 was spent per day on entertaining about 150-200 guests. “Its natural,” says BJP spokesperson Virendar Bisht after RTI query revealed that Uttarakhand chief ministerspent Rs 68,59,865 from the exchequer for buying snacks for his guests. "Such expenses are natural as most of the Janta Darbar & official meetings take place at CM office. But, if they go beyond a limit...

-PTI NEW DELHI: Breaking from past, the Economic Survey for 2017-18 was printed in pink colour as it waded into the problem of gender bias prevalent in India. Indian parents continue to have children until they get the desired number of sons, it said observing that the adverse sex ratio of females to males has led to 63 million "missing" women. The pre-Budget annual document detailing state of economy was in the...