-Economic and Political Weekly The current regime seeks to reform labour laws with the understanding that these reforms will improve industrial growth and expand the possibilities of enterprise. However, there is already ample evidence from within India that this obsession with reforming labour law, particularly in the way the government has done it till now, will not take us any closer in creating more jobs or a healthy industrial sector. These...

-The Hindu To address climate change, India has committed itself to a 20-25 per cent reduction in intensity of carbon emissions by 2020, but the international community will want more U.S. President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping have just signed a historic bilateral accord on climate change and clean energy cooperation in Beijing. This accord will have impacts in the run-up to the Paris Conference in December 2015 when the...

-Business Standard State expects more investment as industry cheers move Paving the way for the first set of labour reforms in the country, President Pranab Mukherjee has given his assent to Rajasthan's amendments to three laws. Among major changes, the Industrial Disputes Act will allow companies employing up to 300 staffers to lay off workers or close down without taking the government's prior approval. Earlier, those with up to 100 employees...

-The Hindu The Union government has also decided to resume providing subsidy on cooking gas through direct cash transfers straight into consumers' bank accounts. The Modi government has frozen the budget subsidy for cooking gas at Rs. 20 a kg. This will not mean any increase in price for the consumer right away. However, if international prices were to rise, as they normally do in winter, then the government will be faced with...

-The Business Standard Most key functions now handled by the finance ministry and other govt departments When Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently extended a Rs 8,000-crore central support for building roads in Jammu & Kashmir, Union Cabinet's approval for the big-ticket announcement came in barely 48 hours. Unlike in the past, the proposal did not get stuck in the corridors of the Planning Commission, a Nehruvian-era body. The Commission, which occupied the centre...