-Scroll.in Institutions that provide cheap or free meals are not mere populism – they are vital for the food security of people on the margins. My first experience of a “community kitchen” was in Brazil where we were taken to try out a meal at the Popular Restaurant in Lauros de Freitas. The serpentine queue outside it surprising initially, seemed entirely unexceptional once we had been served: for one real (approximately Rs...

-Livemint.com It’s time to look at the deleterious environmental impact of subsidies so as to attain correct pricing of resources A few days before Delhi’s odd-even rule—a road rationing scheme in which odd- and even-numbered cars were allowed to ply on roads on alternate days—was to be implemented, Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia appeared on a television channel to answer questions on the rule. During the show, Sisodia admitted that the...

-The Hindu The public now sees the Internet not just in market terms, but as a social phenomenon that requires public interest regulation. In its aggressive campaign for Free Basics, couched in simplistic developmental language, Facebook underestimated the political sophistication of the Indian public. It must be regretting it now. The social networking service’s reportedly Rs. 100-crore campaign, through double full-page newspaper advertisements, billboards and television, appears simply to have congealed public...

-The Hindu Business Line Electoral Trusts bring some transparency to India Inc’s donations to parties, but more needs to be done New Delhi: India Inc makes big donations to Political Parties, but very little is made public on the amount or to whom it is given. Electoral Trusts revealing such data were expected to bring in more transparency. A change in income-tax rules in January 2013 paved the way for the setting up...

-The Hindu Agrarian distress has a cascading effect on all other businesses in the district ANANTAPUR (Andhra Pradesh): The year bygone, so far, has been one of sorrow for the poor of the district, with several of them committing suicide out of desperation and hopelessness. According to estimates of different Political Parties and social organisations, who have also done field level verification of the reports of suicides, no fewer than 150 suicides —...