Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said on Saturday that the country needed to cut down on its dependence on debt to finance its developmental programmes and find ways to reduce the current level of subsidies. "The financing of the plan expenditure has depended far too much on debt. This must change," said Singh while addressing a meeting of the National Development Council (NDC), the country's top policy forum. To fund its...

Young rag-pickers sifting through rubbish are a common image of India’s chronic poverty, but destitute children face new hazards picking apart old computers as part of the growing “e-waste” industry. Asif, aged seven, spends his days dismantling electronic equipment in a tiny, dimly-lit unit in east Delhi along with six other boys. “My work is to pick out these small black boxes,” he said, fingers deftly prising out integrated circuits from the...

Food inflation may increase further in the coming weeks, but there is no cause for alarm as the rise is more the result of the low-base effect, Deputy Chairman of Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahulwalia said on Wednesday. As of May 29, food inflation stood at 16.74 per cent. “It is quite possible that when the data comes out on Thursday, you may see a little increase in food inflation. That...

The Indian Electricity Act, 2003, initially envisaged that the appropriate governments shall endeavour to supply electricity to all areas including villages and hamlets (Section 6), thus placing the responsibility for ensuring rural electricity supply on state governments. The UPA-I government amended this section to read as follows after detailed deliberations internally and with opposition parties: the concerned state government and the central government shall jointly endeavour to provide access to...

A pollution monitoring system developed by Indian scientists has come in for praise from the United Nations as an important step to ensure clean air during the Commonwealth Games. The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO), a specialised agency of the UN, said the System of Air Pollution Forecasting and Research (SAFAR) will serve as an example within India, South Asia and globally. Aimed at managing air quality, it has been developed by the...