-Down to Earth US continues to question India’s patent regime in its latest report. The country was kept in the category where unfavorable conditions exist for ‘innovation’ In April, US president Barack Obama wrote a piece in the Time magazine, praising Prime Minister Narendra Modi. For a few people it MIGht have been a happy moment, but for others it was scary as they tried to read between the lines as to...

-Business Standard A clear picture is likely to emerge only towards the end of June Mumbai: Rural distress owing to heavy unseasonal rains in March and the prospects of less-than-normal monsoon have made bankers “a cautious lot” at the start of this financial year. However, it is too early to conclude that the impact of rains, or the lack of it, would be bad. According to public sector bank executives, the assessment for...

-Livemint.com Agriculturists’s woes are not just forms of a crisis, but also indicate the deceleration of the agrarian economy Unseasonal rain, falling commodity prices, increasing input costs, decreasing size of land holdings, and now the political move to “acquire” all land into the globalizing market. The agony-list that agriculturists can make of their current situation can be even longer for all these are not just forms of a crisis, but also indicate...

-Livemint.com While economists disagree on the extent of rigidity in India’s labour regime, there is a broad consensus on the need to simplify labour laws After showing a sense of urgency initially, the Modi government seemed to have put labour law reforms on the backburner in between. Now, things are simmering once again as the government contemplates integrating three laws—the Trade Unions Act, the Industrial Disputes Act and the Industrial Employment...

-Tehelka PeeBuddy is India’s first attempt at solving the health issue of contracting UTI (Urinary Tract Infection) every time a woman reluctantly decides to use a toilet of dubious sanitary standards in a public establishment. This is a country where 1.2 billion of its populace is used to not having proper public toilets, and women are more susceptible to assaults because they do not have a toilet in their homes. Hence, it...