-The Times of India   National Advisory Council (NAC) member Aruna Roy lashed out at the Planning Commission's new criteria for poverty line submitted to the Supreme Court on Tuesday. "This affidavit reflects the government's deep lack of empathy for the poor and a perspective completely divorced from reality," she said. Roy was reacting to the Plan panel's submission to the Supreme Court, saying if a person's spending exceeds Rs 32 a day in...

Planning Commission, RBI officials hold brainstorming deliberations with experts With the persistent near double-digit headline inflation, despite sustained increases in key policy rates by the Reserve Bank of India, turning out to be “a frustrating experience for policymakers,” senior officials from the Planning Commission, the Finance Ministry and the RBI met with a group of academic economic experts and representatives of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and the...

-The Hindu   The State unit of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) has urged the Centre to defer the generation of power from Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project until all its safety aspects are ensured. In a statement here, CPI(M) secretary G. Ramakrishnan said that after the accident in a Japanese atomic power plant following tsunami, a fear psychosis had cropped up all over the world regarding atomic power stations. This had triggered...

-The Times of India   Speaking at a seminar organized for honouring farmers here on Saturday, Union agriculture minister Sharad Pawar announced that awards should be instituted by all states for honouring innovative work done by farmers in the country. "Rajasthan has already started honouring farmers for their innovative work. The other states should also follow it. I will write to chief ministers of other states to start honouring farmers and give away...

The worse off the poor become, the healthier our Ministers get. Air India might not be doing as well we'd like it to. But the braveheart who flew it fearlessly into dense clouds of debt is doing okay. Praful Patel (who no longer holds the aviation portfolio) added, on average, over half a million rupees every day to his assets in 28 months between May 2009 and August 2011. This might...