-PTI Kolkata: The Trinamul Congress swept the three-tier panchayat polls in West Bengal capturing 13 out of 17 Zilla Parishads, while the Congress put up a poor show with just one in Murshidabad. TMC's clean sweep in the zilla parishads in 11 of 12 south Bengal districts and two out of five north Bengal districts, demonstrated that the two-and-a-half-years of incumbency and controversies, including the Saradha chit fund scam, by and large,...

-PTI The Supreme Court today asked Tata Motors to make its stand clear on its leasehold rights over the Singur land in the wake of changed scenario as the company had already moved its car plant out of West Bengal. "The land was acquired for establishing a car manufacturing plant at Singur. Now the purpose is no more there as you have already moved out. Now you cannot say that you still...

-The Telegraph Kolkata: The Mamata Banerjee government has decided to return nearly 10,000 acres from its land bank to 30,000-odd original owners by the end of the year with an eye on electoral gains, officials said. No one in the government would go on record but The Telegraph has seen a land and land reforms department order, sent to the departments holding the plots and the district authorities, to start the land-return...

-The Business Standard A trail of unfulfilled promises follow her in rural and urban Bengal The furious letter-writing since 2010 about the chit fund industry in West Bengal suggests that everyone knew the industry was going to implode. Bengal has one of the highest rates in small savings, Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Somen Mitra wrote to the prime minister in 2011. The state buys the highest number of new life insurance policies, and...

-The Telegraph The Left today said a degree of consent should be obtained even for land acquisition for public purpose and demanded the land acquisition bill be sent back to a parliamentary committee and not taken up for passage. "The present bill says there is no need for consent of those affected if land is acquired for government purpose. We are opposed to it. We feel a degree of consent is needed...