-Live Mint/ The Wall Street Journal Contributions more than doubled between 2004 and 2009 polls; experts say published figures just tip of the iceberg  Contributions, including money from top companies, to the country’s two largest political parties, the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), more than doubled between the 2004 and 2009 general elections. This revelation affirms a trend of companies, most of which are listed, opting for a transparent route to...

-IANS Gali Janardhana Reddy, a struggling businessman who became a billionaire in less than a decade and dictated terms to BJP in Karnataka, completes a year behind bars Sep 5 on charges of illegal mining. The former Karnataka BJP minister, however, continues to make news -- for wrong reasons though, like cash-for-bail deal which has sent his brother Gali Somashekara, a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislator, also to jail. The third Reddy brother...

-The Hindu ‘Competitive bidding would favour private players, give rise to monopolies’ Even as the controversy over the Comptroller and Auditor-General’s (CAG) report on coal blocks allocation that reportedly caused a loss of Rs. 1.86 lakh crore to the national exchequer rages, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) has said coal allocations and mining, in future, should be done through the public sector. In an article in party organ People’s Democracy, party general...

-The Hindu "Charges of impropriety are unsupported by facts" Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Monday attacked the Comptroller and Auditor-General’s report on the coal blocks allocation during 2004-09, saying any allegation of impropriety was without basis and unsupported by facts. As Parliament has been paralysed during the past week with an unrelenting and combative Bharatiya Janata Party disrupting proceedings in both Houses and demanding his resignation, Dr. Singh chose to make a statement...

-The Hindu There is at last some clarity on the politics of the anti-corruption movements. Baba Ramdev’s dramatic call for Congress- hatao and the ‘political turn’ of the Anna movement have confirmed that a movement aimed at rooting out corruption cannot defer a direct encounter with party politics for very long. The manner in which both decisions were announced left something to be desired. The announcement by ‘Team Anna’ invited serious...