-PTI The prime minister-led selection committees could not arrive at a decision on the appointment of chiefs of Central Information Commission (CIC) and Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) at a meeting held on Saturday. There will be another meeting on the issue shortly, official sources said. The meeting was convened at the prime minister’s residence and was attended by Home Minister Rajnath Singh, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Leader of Congress party in Lok Sabha...

-Hindustan Times A dominant feature of the first year of Narendra Modi's leadership is the quiet dismantling of India's imperfectly realised framework of welfare and rights, covertly, by stealth.   A declared pro-corporate agenda, such as the land acquisition ordinance, proved politically messy and costly. Therefore, the government resorted instead for an enfeebling of the welfare architecture of the country through a combination of fiscal withdrawals, ignoring even legally mandated obligations.   But this attracted...

-The Hindu Without a head, functioning of Central Information Commission has come to a halt When the Bharatiya Janata Party won by a massive majority in the general election last year, one of the key election promises that brought it to power was transparency and accountability in governance. A year later, many of the electoral promises made on that front remain on paper — the Lokpal Bill and the Grievance Redressal Bill,...

-The Hindu Business Line Agriculture development and food security form the foundation of manufacturing growth. Modi must realise this prime minister Narendra Modi’s exhortation ‘Make in India’ would make perfect sense till we realise that by ‘making’ he means manufacturing. But could it be that his focus on manufacturing may come a cropper if we do not ensure that agriculture is placed permanently on a sound footing? The history of the great...

-The Indian Express Mumbai: Aadhaar the basis of several fresh proposals, including introducing Aadhaar-based biometric systems in all Central government offices. Despite the decisive push given to it by the NDA government since it came to power and by prime minister Narendra Modi himself, the ambitious Aadhaar project is far from meeting its target of universal coverage by June this year, also impacting the Direct Benefits Transfer Scheme that is based...