-The Indian Express Concerned about rising levels of air pollution in the city, the Delhi government has commissioned IIT-Kanpur to conduct a comprehensive study of pollution levels and causes. The government plans to use data to formulate a policy to control and reduce air pollution, and initiate a second-generation air action plan. Commissioned last month, the IIT-K study will be the most comprehensive study since the 2007 Central Pollution Control Board and...

-The Hindu   Neha Khator narrates the story of an NGO that transformed a backward village into a bustling city, with funds, of course, but also by fostering a sense of duty in its residents. Vimla Kanwar, a 70-year-old widow, had a problem. After her husband, a handloom yarn spinner, died of cancer, the officials at the Khadi Gram Udyog took away his charkha. Concerned about finding a means of survival at her...

-The Hindu   As TRAI prepares to regulate ownership of news organisations to ensure pluralism, big media houses fear shrinking profits and state control by proxy Rahul Khullar, the straight-talking chairman of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), listened attentively to the senior management executive of Bennett Coleman and Co. Limited, one of India's largest media conglomerates. The latter disagreed with the premise of the discussion - that there was a "problem,"...

-The Telegraph Kolkata: Chief minister Mamata Banerjee today flagged a four-member panel headed by a retired judge, a task force and an ordinance in her first comprehensive comments on the Saradha Group collapse that has triggered fears of a default contagion in Bengal. It was not clear if it was a stray remark or addressed at those seeking immediate relief for depositors but the chief minister also said that "ja gechhey ta...

-The Hindu     The shortened lifespan of the quarry workers of Uttar Pradesh is spent breaking stones and residing among the pollution- laden boulders Mired with sandy roads and rocky terrain, the landscape in south-western Allahabad creates a remarkable mirage under the blue sky. Some of the larger rocks here have sizeable craters formed in them -- a sign of their depletion over time, by an activity that is hazardous yet critical to the...