-The Economic Times KOLKATA: West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee's plan to start a savings scheme with the aim of protecting the poor from losing their money to deposit schemes that promise high returns will be going ahead with the Reserve Bank of India having cleared the participation of state-run banks in the programme. The state government is to launch the plan on November 6. State-run West Bengal Infrastructure Development Finance Corporation...

-The Indian Express The fate of 157 government-approved global clinical trials seemed uncertain on Monday as the Supreme Court ordered the Centre to wait for its nod while the authorities re-examined the cases under the new regulatory regime. Making it clear that clinical trials being conducted in India must be done for the benefit of the people here, a bench of Justices R M Lodha and S K Singh directed the government...

-The Hindu The area will turn into a ‘no-go zone' for mining and thermal power plants The Environment Ministry has decided to turn approximately 60,000 square kilometres of the Western Ghats across six States into an Ecologically Sensitive Area (ESA), banning mining, quarrying, thermal power plants and polluting industries over the entire range. All other projects would be allowed only with the prior Consent of gram sabhas (village councils) in the zone. The...

-Deccan Herald Bangalore: In a significant ruling, the High Court on Friday dismissed a petition by Mahyco Monsanto and others seeking to quash criminal proceedings against them, University of Agriculture Sciences (UAS), Dharwad, and others who have been booked for bio-piracy while developing Bt brinjal. The National Biodiversity Authority (NBA) and Bangalore-based Karnataka State Biodiversity Board (KBB) had filed a criminal complaint before the Principal Civil Judge and JMFC court, Dharwad,...

-Economic and Political Weekly   Much work remains to be done if the new Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act has to mark a meaningful shift for India's adivasi communities. Chitrangada Choudhury (chitrangada@csds.in) Chitrangada Choudhury (chitrangada@csds.in) is a multimedia journalist and researcher, and currently with the Publics and Policies program at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, New Delhi. Among the worst excesses committed in India's six decade-old democracy, the forcible displacment...