-Livemint.com Delayed assessment of loss and settlement of claims by insurance companies may have led to farmers losing faith in Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, say analysts New Delhi: Sharad Markad, a lanky teenager from a marginal farming family in Maharashtra, spent the first day of 2019 scrounging for funds. Faced with a drought, the third in the past five years, Markad had taken it upon himself to build a community cattle...

-The Hindu It is time to stand by those who are being jailed for activism or persons like Naseeruddin Shah who are raising questions about growing intolerance in the country, Professor Amartya Sen told reporters here on Monday. “There is growing intolerance compared to the past. Many activists are now jailed as Maoist sympathisers…it is extraordinary violation of human rights. Even Naseeruddin Shah is targeted. “We should stand by those who are targeted...

-The Hindu Business Line The Supreme Court on Tuesday paved the way for Vedanta to reopen the Sterlite copper smelter plant in Thoothukudi, Tamil Nadu, refusing to stay the December 15 order of the National Green Tribunal (NGT). A Bench headed by Justice RF Nariman today heard two cases on the issue. The first was on the stay given by the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on the NGT order...

-The Indian Express Justice Jeevan Reddy in the Mandal judgment held that “a backward class cannot be determined only and exclusively with reference to economic criterion. It may be a consideration or basis along with and in addition to social backwardness, but it can never be the sole criterion...” The decision of the Union Cabinet to provide reservation of 10% for “economically weaker sections of the people who are not covered...

-The Hindu Business Line If the Centre had stuck to its ‘minimum government’ promise, it may have met the note-ban goals – without the pain In a New Year’s Day interview to a news agency, Prime Minister Narendra Modi revisited his government’s demonetisation move of November 2016. Perhaps this was born of the realisation that the notebandi decision and its impact on the economy would likely define the NDA government’s term in...