-The Times of India The Union government downplayed the opposition's concern over allowing foreign direct investment in multi-brand retail and informed the Supreme Court on Friday that the policy, when fully implemented, would touch the lives of only 13.3% of the country's population living in 53 cities. The government said its policy on FDI in multi-brand retail stipulated that retail sales outlets could be set up only in cities with a population...

-PTI The postal department plans to enter the banking business with the Reserve Bank of India deciding to grant new bank licences to entities with credible track-record. Consultant appointed Sources said the Department of Posts, which has a strong foot print in rural areas, has appointed Ernst and Young (E&Y) as the consultant for the proposed ‘Post Bank’ “Ernst and Young is expected to submit a detailed project report by April, after which all...

-The Times of India All antibiotics, TB drugs and other habit-forming medicines may soon come with a label warning users about the dangers of taking them without medical advice. Recommending this to the health ministry as a way to address the problem of drug resistance, a task force has also suggested creating a new category, H1, for these drugs by amending the Drugs and Cosmetics Rules, 1945. Health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad...

-The Times of India As many as 436 people died last year due to serious adverse events (SAE) during clinical trials. Investigations are now on to ascertain how many of the deaths were caused by drugs administered to the trial subjects. Union health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad said on Friday that deaths could be due to life-threatening diseases such as cancer, heart failure and stroke or side-effects of the drugs or their...

-The Times of India It isn't just foreign investors who would have remembered the last Budget as a tough one. Even women lost out as the government withdrew tax benefits that were introduced in the form of higher tax exemption limit in 2000-2001. In 2000-01, Yashwant Sinha, the then finance minister, had introduced a special provision under which the basic tax exemption limit for women was pegged higher than that for men....