-PTI A bill to protect the rights of street vendors and regulate street vending activities was introduced in the Lok Sabha today amid opposition uproar over coal block allocation. The Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Bill was introduced in the Lok Sabha by Minister of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation Kumari Selja. As per the provisions of the Bill, anyone over 14 years can register with the Town...

-The Telegraph The Supreme Court has said it wants to end judicial monitoring of social welfare schemes, saying the task should be left to experts and courts “can’t be setting economic policy”. The court had earlier taken umbrage at the government for fixing the poverty line at a measly Rs 32 per day per person in urban areas and suggested free distribution of foodgrain, causing consternation in the government which felt that...

-PTI Rajya Sabha MPs will get to stay in new four-bedroom apartments, each costing Rs.2 crore, under a housing project whose foundation stone was laid on Tuesday by Vice-President Mohammad Hamid Ansari. There will be a total 14 apartments, 28 servant quarters, a common reception hall and a gym, besides some other facilities, which will come up on a 0.6-acre land on Talkatora Road. Apart from the Constitution Club, this will be...

-Frontline Health activists say the health chapter of the Twelfth Plan document exaggerates the role of the private sector in providing health care. The draft chapter on health for the Twelfth Five Year Plan document not only is grossly inadequate in its approach but exaggerates to unrealistic levels the role of the private sector in providing health care. It invokes the concept of universal health care (UHC), but, critics say, it...

-The Hindu A day after the Union Cabinet approved the Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood & Regulation of Street Vending) Bill, 2012, the National Association of Street Vendors of India organised a meeting at Jantar Mantar on Saturday and hailed the decision with the hope that Parliament would now pass the Bill in its current session. Association national coordinator Arbind Singh said, “The struggle of street vendors has yielded result. We have...