-The Telegraph   Land protesters today uprooted a portion of the fencing for the airport city project at Andal near Durgapur claiming the plot belonged to them and alleged that they were yet to get compensation. The crowd of over 50, which included farmers, share-croppers and farm labourers, marched to the site in Dakshinkhanda area, 200km from Calcutta, around 11.30am. They first shouted slogans and then yanked off barbed wires put up for the...

Indian public policy often short-circuits because there are too many crossed wires: one agency trying to do another’s work, and arguments being invoked in contexts in which they are inappropriate. There has been much speculation about the Ministry of Home Affairs’ objections to Aadhar in its current form. But it will be a travesty if the project of identification is moved from its current service delivery-oriented paradigm to a security-oriented...

-The Financial Express   The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIADI) has launched a micro ATM device that would enable beneficiaries like MG-NREGA workers with Aadhaar to withdraw money near their doors through core banking system. "The beneficiary has to put his finger and Aadhaar number in to the micro ATM wireless device and get the money within 8 to 9 seconds from a business correspondent after verification about the beneficiary having that...

The Jharkhand government has appealed to Maoist rebels to make a fresh beginning in the New Year by surrendering to the rule of law, as it responded to feelers from a section of cadres, but did not promise any let-up in ongoing anti-rebel operations. The government gave a month’s time to active members of CPI(Maoist) to return to the mainstream, through an advertisement in local dailies on December 31. In the public...

It’s not only the Calcutta business chambers that have come out in support of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry’s (Ficci) reproachful stand on the way the Bengal government is handling investigations into the AMRI fire tragedy. Closer home, Federation of Jharkhand Chambers of Commerce and Industries (FJCCI) also feels that the police action against seven directors of AMRI Hospitals, Dhakuria, “was not completely non-discriminatory”. A day after Bengal...