-The Hindu ‘Report has permitted uncontrolLED quarrying in most parts of ghats' Kochi (Kerala): The Kasturirangan report has thrown open the ecologically sensitive areas of Western Ghats to mindless exploitation which would seriously hazard ecology, according to its critics. According to member of the Western Ghats Ecology Expert Panel (WGEEP) V.S. Vijayan: the report has in a way permitted uncontrolLED quarrying in most parts of the ghats regions of the State. Those...

-The Asian Age Reserve Bank deputy governor K.C. Chakraborty has finally set the record straight on what is well known in left-wing development circles: that Corporate India's loans waived by banks are more (over Rs. 1 lakh crore in the past 13 years) than farm loans to the tune of Rs. 60,000 crores written off under the Debt Waiver and Debt Relief Scheme. More revealing is that medium and large units have...

-The Telegraph Thiruvananthapuram: The Centre's move to implement an ecology panel's report on conservation of the Western Ghats has provoked a call for a 48-hour civil disobedience agitation by the Catholic Church in Kerala, starting Sunday midnight. The Church claims the K. Kasturirangan report, notified on Wednesday, will hit the livelihoods of farmers living in the "high ranges" - foothill areas bordering the forests - and force them to relocate. Green activists deny...

-Outlook Kolkata: The Opposition Left Front in West Bengal today demanded Rs 5,50,000 crore for the state during 2015-2020 period, which is more than double of what the ruling Trinamool Congress government had demanded from the 14th Finance Commission. "We from the Left Front had met the 14th Finance Commission and the meeting was fruitful. We had demanded about Rs 5,50,000 crore for the state," former state finance minister Asim Dasgupta said...

-The Hindustan Times Patna: Panic-stricken people in Meghalaya today rushed to grocery stores and purchased salt at exorbitant prices following wild rumours that the commodity was in short supply. In neighbouring West Bengal, similar rumours sent people in Siliguri, Darjeeling and Jalpaiguri districts rushing to stores and buy salt at Rs100-150 a kg since Thursday night. In Bihar, where it all started, the police arrested 21 persons on charges of hoarding and...