-Down to Earth Entrepreneurs now see business opportunity in waste paper. The raddiwala employed with start-ups can be summoned to home with the click of a mouse or a phone call AMRINDER SINGH, 57, is a government employee living in south Delhi's Lajpat Nagar. His neighbours say he has a big heart-he donates generously for religious functions and other community services in his locality. His domestic help, too, is all praise for...

-The Indian Express   Farmers' groups point to lack of marketing support, MSAMB blames internal shortcomings. Pune: Almost two years after the state government introduced the concept of direct selling of fruits and vegetables by farmers' groups, lack of awareness drives and internal shortcomings seem to have impeded its success. At present, 68 farmers' groups are directly selling their products at 226 locations in Pune and Pimpri-Chinchwad. The initiative to allow farmers to directly...

-TheWeekendLeader.com Despite a drought-like situation across Rajasthan this year, farmers of a small village on the edge of the Thar Desert reaped good harvest from their fruit orchards. They are growing vegetables this winter. Just five years ago, residents of Khidrat struggled to arrange drinking water, let alone water for irrigation. Due to scanty rainfall (see table), groundwater was not only dipping, it had turned brackish. Even deep borewells would yield saline...

-Live Mint The national food security law is in trouble from an unlikely source The outcome of the World Trade Organization (WTO) summit at Bali has been projected as a great victory for the Indian government by its spokespersons. Nothing could be farther from the truth. In exchange for a temporary reprieve on its food support programme, India has bartered away the bargaining chip of trade facilitation, which Western negotiators demanded. The...

-The Hindu One of the most prominent features of India’s middle-class-driven public culture has been an obsession about our GDP growth rate, and a facile equation of that number with a sense of national achievement or impending arrival into affluence. In media headlines, political speeches, and everyday conversations, the GDP growth rate number — whether it is five per cent or eight per cent or whatever — has become a staple...