-The Telegraph New Delhi: The Centre is likely to make key changes to the land acquisition ordinance in the face of gathering protests from multiple flanks and a nudge by Swadeshi affiliates. A clause that expanded the list of projects exempted from prior consent of affected families and a social impact assessment is expected to be done away with, said sources privy to discussions that have been going on through the week. The...

-Economic and Political Weekly   Amendments proposed by the previous Congress-led union government to the Panchayat (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act 1996 had the potential of improving upon this progressive legislation. Unfortunately, with its successor pursuing different priorities, the possibility of the amendments being passed remains rather low. Kamal Nayan Choubey (kamalnayanchoubey@gmail.com) is with the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, New Delhi. A bill for an amendment to the Panchayat (Extension to Scheduled Areas)...

-The Hindustan Times New Delhi: A new study says that high particulate matter (PM) pollution reduces life expectancy by 3.2 years for 660 million Indians in polluted urban conglomerates, including Delhi, which means a loss of 2.1 billion life years. "The loss of more than two billion life years is a substantial price to pay for air pollution," says the study done by researchers at Chicago University, Yale University and Harvard University."This...

-Outlook The BJP government needs to understand that "vikas" means growth and development, not growth alone. The new government that came to power with the promise of "vikas" has launched an unrelenting attack on social welfare programmes and legislations. In October 2014, there was a rumour that NREGA would be restricted to some districts. Though the changes proposed have not been implemented, NREGA is in danger of dying a slow death...

-The Hindu The challenge for the Modi government is to evaluate what works in development programming before making large spending decisions Governments in India have always launched big-ticket social development programmes with ambitious goals. The Narendra Modi government is no exception. Swachh Bharat Abhiyan aims to make India open defecation-free by 2019. The Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana's financial inclusion programme set a target of opening 10 crore bank accounts by January...