-Firstpost.com Think of it as a 50-over one-day cricket match, with each day equivalent to an over. The  game has just begun. The government of India, popularly known as Modi sarkar, has just created a 50-day hawala window for those with black money – albeit in a loose sense. The term hawala is usually used for illegal trade in foreign exchange going back to the times before 1993 when India had tight...

-Livemint.com Nandan Nilekani, one of the brains behind the Unified Payments Interface, on the near-term challenges of going cashless While the government’s decision to scrap Rs500 and Rs1,000 bank notes has been met with resistance from some quarters and been called too abrupt, Infosys co-founder Nandan Nilekani backed it, saying it was needed to speed up the move to a cashless economy. “There is no question that this is a very bold...

-The Economic Times NEW DELHI: Civil society group All India Drug Action Network (AIDAN) has sent legal notices to Niti Aayog CEO and secretaries to the health ministry, department of pharmaceuticals and department of industrial policy and promotion over their talks to cut powers of the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority. The group has termed the move “anti-national” and “anti-people”, adding that it affects an ongoing case at the Supreme Court over various...

-The Indian Express The poor adoption of a machine that can help avoid paddy stubble burning is an example of policy failure. Jalandhar/ Ludhiana: There is virtual unanimity — at least among scientists and aware farmers — that the ultimate solution to the recurrent problem of paddy stubble burning at this time of the year lies in the ‘Happy Seeder’ developed by the Punjab Agricultural University (PAU) in 2002. But more than...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: Delhi's 1,800-odd municipal schools have declared a holiday tomorrow citing predictions of "very poor" smog and the health risk it poses, but critics rued that over a million poor children would MISs their midday meals. Some parents said the slum children who go to these schools would be playing on the smoggy streets anyway if classes were closed. This is the first time so many schools will close in...