-The Economic Times NEW DELHI: After a successful Bharat Bandh against the Supreme Court judgement on the SC/ST Act, the government is worried about losing the perception battle to rival political parties on being pro-Dalit. While the suggestion for issuing an Ordinance-if needed to counter an adverse SC verdict on the review petitioncame from the Prime Minister’s Office, some cabinet ministers are of the view that issues like reservation in promotion and...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The Centre is considering doubling the monthly pay of the country's 25 lakh midday meal cook-cum-helpers to Rs 2,000, but the unions say the proposed raise is too little. The cooks' current pay of Rs 1,000 - a fraction of the official minimum wages - has been static since 2009, with successive governments keeping a proposed hike pending for the past five years. Now, a year before the general...

-The Indian Express According to the Met department, Punjab may receive heavy showers coupled with strong winds till April 11. Experts have advised farmers to construct trenches and dig up some earth on the sides of the field in case there is rain. Jalandhar: Even as Punjab received mild to heavy rainfall coupled with hailstorm and cyclonic winds last night and wee hours Monday, however, no loss of ready-to-harvest wheat crop was...

-The Hindu Business Line Hyderabad University linguist discovers Walmiki and Malhar, spoken by small communities in Odisha. Hyderabad: A linguist from the University of Hyderabad (UoH) has stumbled on two languages called Walmiki and Malhar both predominantly in the remote region’s of Odisha. The languages are categorised `endangered’ as the number of people speaking is small. For instance Malhar is spoken by just 75 including children from a particular community. These people live...

-Hindustan Times The agriculture ministry has started a new programme to focus on millets or coarse cereal production, mostly grown by small and poor farmers New Delhi: The Narendra Modi government has decided to include millets in the public distribution system for which it is procuring these grains at federally fixed minimum support prices, agriculture minister Radha MoHAn Singh said. The agriculture ministry has started a new programme to focus on millets or...