-The Telegraph   Prakash Karat today said the spate of farmer suicides was the fallout of the “collapse’’ of the Mamata Banerjee government’s crop-procurement system and that it was “unfortunate’’ that cultivators were “suffering” within eight months of Trinamul coming to power. “The central committee expressed serious concern at the growing number of farmer suicides in Bengal. There are reports that 24 farmers have taken their lives. This reflects not only on the...

The smart card versus unique identity number battle between P. Chidambaram and Montek Singh Ahluwalia will hit the ground tomorrow at Porthapur village in Andaman and Nicobar Islands when the home minister hands out the first tranche of 2.56 lakh resident identity cards. The resident cards are a rival to the unique identity number conceived by the PlanNINg Commission to establish authentic identification for each resident and cut out corruption in...

-The Hindu   While Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and her government sought to downplay the fact that farmers were being forced to commit suicide in the State because of penurious conditions, Leader of the Opposition Surya Kanta Mishra said here on Monday that the Chief Minister keeps maintaiNINg that nothing is wrong whenever anything construed as a criticism of her government is brought to her notice. Not in concurrence with claims that farmers...

The Supreme Court on Monday posted for final hearing on March 27 a CBI special leave petition against a judgment of the Allahabad High Court, which upheld the dropping of the conspiracy charge by a special court against BJP leaders L. K. Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi, Uma Bharti and 18 others in the Babri Masjid demolition case. Senior counsel Ravi Shankar Prasad drew the court's attention to the fact that the...

Soon, radiologists can work in only two ultrasound facilities at the maximum, and that too within a single district. In a landmark decision to save the girl child, the Union health ministry in the Central Supervisory Board (CSB) meeting of the Pre-conception & Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques Act, 1994, chaired by health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad cleared the proposal. The CSB also passed the recommendation that radiologists will have to clearly specify working...