-Frontine Walmart’s disclosure that it spent huge amounts of money on lobbying in India and the allegation that it entered the retail sector through indirect means highlight the power of global capital in dictating the country’s policies. The world’s largest multi-brand retailer Walmart’s disclosure to the United States Senate that it had spent $25 million (Rs.135 crore) since 2008 on its various lobbying activities, which include enhancing access to the Indian...

-The Hindu With a single stroke, the government has made over 3.5 crore existing post office accounts ready for its new Aadhaar-linked cash transfer scheme. The accounts, which belong to MGNREGA workers over the country, were originally to be used only for receiving wages under the rural employment guarantee scheme. However, the government has now woken up to the potential of using the ready-made network of accounts to directly transfer benefits such...

-The Telegraph A rights organisation today accused the Centre and state governments of giving huge, unaccounted grants to NGOs including blacklisted ones, often against a bribe. The Asian Centre for Human Rights said it was basing its claims on replies to a series of RTI applications it had filed in 2010. Releasing the report, “India’s Funds to NGOs Squandered”, the rights body’s director, Suhas Chakma, made these claims at a news conference...

-Deccan Chronicle The Annual Status of Education Report 2012 has revealed the standard of school education is not up to the mark in rural India, and claimed over half the children in these areas were at least three grade levels behind in reading and arithmetic abilities.   The report, prepared by Unicef backed NGO Pratham, claimed of all Class V students only 46.8 per cent could read a Class II text. Though 2012...

-The Indian Express Gadchiroli: A top Naxal leader who surrendered recently has said that the government’s twin strategy of security with development has begun to hurt the Maoists, leaving the morale of their cadre affected. “The senior leadership of the party (CPI Maoist) is worried over setbacks due to Operation Greenhunt and the various developmental works undertaken by the government in remote areas of districts like Gadchiroli,” Badarpu Mallaiyya alias Shekhar, the...