-The Telegraph New Delhi: The Narendra Modi government on Wednesday cited a 2004 UPA decision on foreign assistance to turn down offers of Kerala flood aid from various countries although the National Disaster Management Plan 2016 allows the Centre to accept such help. The move triggered allegations of "policy confusion" from the CPM that heads the state government. Breaking its silence on such offers after Kerala chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan announced on Tuesday...

-The Tribune The lure for land at a reasonable rate and better funding options are drawing farmer-entrepreneurs from Punjab and Haryana to Canada The North American nation is drawing farmer-entrepreneurs in large numbers from India’s breadbasket — Punjab and Haryana. No, they aren’t the rich ones buying luxury villas in exotic locales. They are the aspiring ones who expect to hit pay dirt as authorities in the former English colony provide agricultural...

-Business Standard The payroll data has been revised downwards for each of the nine months between September 2017 and May this year New Delhi: The net enrolment numbers released by the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) has been revised down by 12.4 per cent for the September-May period, from an earlier estimate of 4.5 million to 3.9 million. The payroll count in June rose by 24 per cent to 793,308. The net enrolment...

-ThePRInt.in Report by government-backed panel has pegged average growth under UPA at 8%, higher than that during 4 years under NDA. New Delhi: The Modi government has said that a GDP report that showed higher growth during the UPA years than under four years of NDA rule is only a draft and “should not be quoted anywhere”. The back-series GDP growth report was published on the website of the Ministry of Statistics and...

-Hindustan Times The ecologist said extensive stone quarrying and mushrooming of high-rises as part of tourism, and illegal forest land acquisition by PRIvate parties are the major reasons for the recent floods in the state. Pune: Ecologist Madhav Gadgil, founder of the Centre for Ecological Sciences at the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, has described the floods in Kerala as a man-made disaster; a reaction to the illegal excavations, stone quarrying done...