-IANS BANGALORE: Karnataka is facing a drought and water levels in reservoirs across the Cauvery river basin have dropped due to deficit rains, a Central Water Commission (CWC) official said on Saturday. "I have realised that there is drought in Karnataka due to deficit rainfall and water levels in the reservoirs of Cauvery are lower than last year due to a weak monsoon," CWC member KC Jacob told reporters here. Assuring the state...

-Tehelka Policy flaw lets private players jack up prices and siphon off massive government subsidies. TO DROUGHTS and abject poverty, farmers can add another crisis: sky-rocketing fertiliser prices. The issue has prompted eight chief ministers of large states to seek the intervention of the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilisers (MoCF) in the matter. Consider, for example, di-ammonium phosphate (DAP) and muriate of potash (MoP), two fertilisers that used to have massive demand...

-First Post It is impossible to talk about Indian publishing without discussing Samir Jain, whose invisible hand  guided The Times of India group to become  India’s – and probably the world’s – most profitable media company. Despite its relatively small size in the global league (Rupert Murdoch’s NewsCorp is 20 times bigger in terms of revenues), Jain’s Bennett, Coleman & Co Ltd (BCCL) packs a huge punch and is Indian publishing’s...

Remember Arjun Sengupta Committee Report? It’s the same report which put paid to government’s shifting poverty estimates by asserting that almost 80% Indian survive on less than Rs 20 per day. Known as the National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganized Sector (NCEUS), the report has gone missing from the public domain. The official website of NCEUS is no more working: http://nceus.gov.in, raising doubts regarding someone, somewhere trying to hide...

-The Economic Times The recent decision of the government to allow FDI in multi-brand retail trade has attracted heated debate and emotive reactions. Though the main consideration for allowing FDI in retail is not its benefit for farm sector, the debate has predominantly focused on threats and benefits to the country's farmers and the farm sector. Interestingly, the main stakeholders, i.e., farmers, have not reacted much to the policy decision and...