-The Hindu     The Land Act leaves plenty of room for States and the Centre to bypass it and acquire land under other laws that do not provide adequate compensation and rehabilitation The amended version of the Land Acquisition Act has been passed, but it does not entirely settle the issues of dubious takeover of land and failure to pay fair compensation. Although renamed the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land...

-PTI NEW DELHI: Flagging the challenge of raising foodgrain production, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today promised all assistance to states for improving agricultural growth. "It's a challenging job to increase production of foodgrains and other crops for the growing population of the country, especially, because agriculture is still dependent on monsoon in large parts of the country," he said, addressing a gathering of farmers, who arrived here as part of a nationwide...

-PTI Farmers in Cheyyur in Tamil Nadu have demanded compensation as per rates fixed in the legislation for their farm lands Kancheepuram (TN): Even before the Land Acquisition Bill receives Presidential Assent and became an act, farmers in Cheyyur in Tamil Nadu have demanded compensation as per rates fixed in the legislation for their farm lands sought to be acquired by a subsidiary of Power Finance Corporation for a power plant. The farmers...

-Outlook Kochi: Around 25,000 gram panchayats across India will be networked by 2014 end as part of the National Optical Fibre Network programme in the first such scheme to connect so many people, Communications and IT Minister Kapil Sibal said here today. "This project would be the first of its kind in the world launched by any government connecting such a large population," he said after inaugurating 'Vidya Jyothi,' an initiative of...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Unlike recent Parliament sessions when a large part of the sittings were complete washouts, the just-ended monsoon session saw passage of 10 legislations including UPA's flagship bills - food security and Land Acquisition. An official statement from parliamentary affairs minister Kamal Nath listed details of bills passed by both the Houses and legislations that were cleared separately by Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. Nath had said...