To help farmers in eastern India tide over the drought, the National Seed Corporation (NSC) has distributed tonnes of short-duration crop seeds to state government of West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand and Orissa. “We are have distributed 11,000 quintal of short-duration crop seeds to Bihar and Jharkhand and 1,000 quintal to West Bengal,” NSC chairman and managing director SK Roongta told reporters on the sidelines of the 47th annual general meeting of...

The government’s ambitious plan of building around 18,637 km expressways by 2022 has hit a roadblock. Following the recent farmers protests against the Yamuna expressway project in Uttar Pradesh and Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s remark favouring justifiable compensation for land acquisition, the government has decided to go back to the drawing board on the creation of an expressway authority and the funding pattern of the projects. The ministry of road...

The state government has decided to return fertile land that had been notified for a special economic zone (SEZ) by Bharat Forge, close on the heels of Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s remark that land acquisition must be done in a manner that does not cause loss of large tracts of productive agricultural land. She has also called for a humane approach while acquiring land. "The decision to return 583 hectares of...

KEY TRENDS   • Section 105 of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in the Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013, which provides for excluding 13 Central legislation, including Land Acquisition (Mines) Act 1885, Atomic Energy Act, 1962, Railway Act 1989, National Highways Act 1956 and Metro Railways (Construction of Works) Act, 1978, from its purview, has been amended for payment of compensation with rigours $ • The amendments have now...

Health experts from more than 100 countries gathered in Bangkok today under the auspices of the United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) to discuss ways to make life-saving medical equipment more accessible to people in developing countries. “The medical device industry holds great promise for public health, sometimes spectacular promise, sometimes seductive promise,” Margaret Chan, the WHO Director-General, told the more than 350 experts meeting in Thailand’s capital. “Health officials and hospital...