-The Telegraph Chandigarh: Bureaucrats in Haryana now have to stand up - "meticulously correct and courteous" - every time an MP or an MLA visits their office, according to a circular. The circular had been issued in the last week of May but came to light following the standoff between the Delhi government led by Arvind Kejriwal and IAS officers in Delhi. Several senior Haryana-cadre bureaucrats in Chandigarh claimed they had heard about...

-PTI Consumption of honey, cheese rises: study Patna: Prohibition is making people of Bihar spend on good clothes and food with sale of expensive sarees rising by 1,751%, while consumption of honey by 380% and that of cheese by 200% in the first six months of the ban, according to latest studies on the measure. The studies, conducted by think tank Asian Development Research Institute (ADRI) and government-funded Development Management Institute (DMI), also...

-The Hindu Activist sought copy of proposed amendments An activist has accused the government of “illegally” withholding information about amendments proposed to the Right to Information Act, 2005, after her plea seeking details about the procedure followed was turned down. RTI activist Anjali Bharadwaj wrote to the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) last month demanding to know when were the amendments to the Act proposed and forwarded to the Union Cabinet. She...

-Hindustan Times Osmanabad, and Yavatmal in Vidarbha are two of the worst affected districts in the state, in the last seven years. In a recent study of 450 families that have witnessed farmer suicides in Osmanabad district of Marathwada, the Tata Institute of Social Studies (TISS) found that farmers from nuclear families are more vulnerable to commit suicide than those in joint families. Osmanabad, and Yavatmal in Vidarbha are two of the worst...

-Down to Earth The criteria for exemption from labelling of food containing GM ingredients need to be much stricter The draft Food Safety and Standards (Labelling and Display) Regulations, 2018, released by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) in April 2018, may be a good beginning, but it has major gaps that needs to be plugged to make it effective, according to the analysis of the draft regulations...