-The Hindustan Times In June 1992, Manmohan Singh, then finance minister in the Government of India, delivered the Foundation Day Address of the Society for Promotion of Wastelands Development (SPWD). He spoke on the topic ‘Environment and the New Economic Policies’. In his talk, Singh urged “objective standards industry-wise for safeguarding the environment, asking industry to certify compliance with these standards, institution of an effective system of verification and industry audit...

-The Hindu Auction alone cannot be insisted upon for disposal of all types of natural resources, Attorney General (AG) G.E. Vahanvati asserted in the Supreme Court on Thursday. Such an approach mandated in the 2G judgment, apart from being impractical in certain situations, can be counter-productive and can impact planned and coordinated growth and economy of the country, the AG told a five-judge Constitution Bench comprising Chief Justice S.H. Kapadia and Justices...

-The Hindu ‘Law declared insofar as spectrum cannot be extended to other natural resources’   The far-reaching nature of implementing the 2G judgment insofar as it was extended to Auctioning of all natural resources (other than spectrum) would have a huge impact on Foreign Direct Investment and other investments in this country, argued Attorney General G.E. Vahanvati in the Supreme Court on Thursday. Justifying the Presidential Reference and the need for an advisory opinion...

-CNN-IBN The Central Government on Thursday accepted before the Supreme Court the Auction route for allocating 2G spectrum. Attorney General G E Vahanvati told the Supreme Court that the Centre favoured Auction for future sale of spectrum.   But the government is yet to decide on whether it favours Auction for sale of all scarce natural resources to commercial parties. The apex court had on Wednesday said that it cannot reject the presidential reference...

-The Times of India   The Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed that the government had reasons to doubt its verdict laying down Auction as the only way of allocating natural resources, in what is seen as an indication of a significant judicial rethink.  "On cancellation of spectrum licences allotted without following a transparent system, there is no doubt about its correctness. But if one reads the judgment to mean that Auction must be...