Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's direct involvement in the finance ministry has renewed reform vigour among officials, who plan steps to reform fuel pricing and accelerate domestic oil exploration, government and industry officials said. According to officials fuel pricing reforms are expected after mid July post Presidential poll, which would include a hike in diesel rates by atleast Rs 3 per litre and limiting highly subsidized cooking gas cylinders to four refills...

Madhya Pradesh's Gross Domestic Product ( GDP) growth rate has swelled to 12 per cent in the last fiscal from 8 per cent in 2010-11, according to the revised estimates, officials said on Friday.  Besides, the state, having agrarian economy, recorded 18 per cent agriculture growth rate in 2011 - 12, they added.  The economic and agriculture growth is bound to benefit a huge populace engaged in construction and agriculture sector by...

-IANS Many chief ministers, including non-Congress ones, support the proposal to allow foreign direct Investment (FDI) in multi-brand retail, Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma said Wednesday. "Now you have a fairly good number of chief ministers who have come out in support...We have continued a dialogue in a democratic spirit, a very open dialogue with the states," Sharma told reporters here after Coca-Cola Chairman Muhtar Kent met him. Sharma said he had...

-The Business Standard When the anti-Posco brigade celebrated the seventh anniversary of their agitation against the mega steel venture of the South Korean behemoth at Dhinkia near Paradip in Odisha last week, the noise they made against the project was drowned by the murmurs of a split in their ranks. After fighting against the project for the last seven years, Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS) seems to be disintegrating, with many of...

The finance ministry has asked state-run banks to stop making payments to their customers through cheques from July 1 and to "migrate totally" to electronic payment channels, a move aimed at cutting costs in a sluggish economy.  In a circular issued to chairmen of public sector banks and regional rural banks, the ministry said all payments to customers, staff, vendors and suppliers as well as disbursement of loans and payments towards...