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Financial Express Jan 16, 2018 The Maharashtra government has decided to withdraw the facility of co-marketing of brands for BT cotton seed companies, top officials of the state agriculture department said. A meeting was called by the department recently, where seed companies were given directions that they will no longer be permitted to co-market BT seeds under separate brand names, agriculture commissioner Sachendra Pratap Singh said. “There is no question of any opposition from the seed companies. The circular has been issued and they were called just to know about the guidelines,” he told FE. This is part of the regulatory framework. The brand marketing licences of as many as 74 companies has been scrapped, he said. Until now, seed companies used to co-market the same variety under different brand names making it confusing for the farmer, he said. The government had earlier asked the companies to amend their licences issued for co-marketing as per the permissions granted by...

DailyHunt Jan 16, 2018 It has been a fast and furious ride - almost unidirectional - this January, as government reform measures on FDI rationalisation and gushing overseas and domestic liquidity has lifted all boats. For the first fortnight of trade, bulge bracket foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) have been net buyers of Indian equity to the tune of Rs 806.20 crore. Interestingly, their exposure to Indian equity in the New Year has been divided into two parts from January 1 to January 8, they bought aggressively Rs 2,432 crore and then the next few days they have sold on successive days, only to be net buyers again on January 15, a tiny bite of Rs 32 crore. Domestic institutional investors as always have remained a counter weight, maintaining equilibrium - net buyers amount to Rs 1,273 crore. On the days that FPIs sold, they bought aggressively with net buyers totalling Rs 2,590 crore. Some stocks have been on fire as both sector and stock churning is clearly visibl...

The Hindu Jan 16, 2018 Drug regulator refuses to share its findings under the RTI Nearly seven years after the Indian drug regulator, the Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) began investigating nine Andhra-based clinical research organisations (CROs) over allegations of coercing people into joining clinical trials, it has refused to share its findings under the Right to Information (RTI) Act. When public-health activist and whistle-blower in the Ranbaxy cheating case, Dinesh S. Thakur, and Prashant Reddy Thikkavarapu, assistant professor at Hyderabad’s National Academy for Legal Studies and Research (NALSAR), asked the DCGI for the investigation’s findings, the regulator cited Sections 8(1)(e) and (h) of the RTI Act to deny the information. These two sections, respectively, exempt a public authority from disclosing information if such disclosure violates the authority’s “fiduciary relationship” with another body (the CRO in this case), and if it impedes an inv...

DAWN Jan 16, 2018 After expiry of the deadline set by the Tehreek-i-Labaik Ya Rasool Allah for the acceptance of its demands, the party on Monday announced it would launch a ‘Jail Bharo’ (fill the jails) movement from Jan 27. The party’s demands include resignations of law minister Rana Sanaullah, making of Raja Zafarul Haq report public and compensation for those killed during Tehreek-i-Khatm-i-Nabuwat. At a press conference here, Labaik chief Ashraf Asif Jalali said 100 workers of his party from Lahore would court arrest in front of the Punjab Assembly building on Jan 27, launching the movement. From the very next day (Jan 28), he added, 100 workers of the party from other cities would start courting arrests daily till all jails of Punjab got filled. “The government has made repeated promises to the Tehreek for meeting all its demands but it failed to keep them. The movement has been reminding it (the government) of all the promises and extended deadline twice ...

The Times Of India Jan 16, 2018 'Prasad', 'luggage', 'stuff', 'bahis', 'gamlas': these mundane expressions, allegedly code for bribes, stand out in the conversations recorded by the CBI as part of its probe into the Lucknow medical college scam which is considered among the triggers of the troubles presently roiling the Supreme Court. Transcripts of the discussions recorded by CBI of retired Odisha HC judge I M Quddusi, who was jailed, alleged middleman Vishwanath Agarwala and B P Yadav of Prasad Education Trust have been cited to accuse them of seeking favours from judiciary for the promoters of private medical colleges who were found to be lacking in infrastructure and, thus, asked to pause fresh admissions. The recordings, in fact, suggest that the alleged fixers had promised a whole set of education entrepreneurs that they with their contacts in judiciary, will secure relief from Medical Council of India's order to de-reco...

The Hindu Jan 16, 2018 It is not usual to think of soils in the context of climate change. Policy is usually focussed on reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the electricity sector, transport and industry. There has, however, been a renewed interest in understanding how soils can serve as a sink for carbon dioxide since atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide have crossed 410 parts per million and oceans are already turning acidic. Besides, increasing soil carbon offers a range of co-benefits and this would buy us time before other technologies can help us transition to a zero-carbon lifestyle. Significant carbon pools on earth are found in the earth’s crust, oceans, atmosphere and land-based ecosystems. Soils contain roughly 2,344 Gt (1 gigatonne = 1 billion tonnes) of organic carbon, making this the largest terrestrial pool. Soil organic carbon (SOC) comes from plants, animals, microbes, leaves and wood, mostly found in the first metre or so. There are many c...

THE ECONOMIC TIMES Jan 16, 2018 India's drug regulator is looking to inspect US pharmaceutical facilities making "critical" medicines so that only high quality products are imported from them, three government officials have said.  After taking action against drug makers in China for quality lapses earlier this month, the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO) has turned its attention to other overseas manufacturers, including those in countries with stringent regulatory systems such as the US and European countries, the officials said on condition of anonymity. A proposal to this effect was sent to the health ministry late last week, one official aware of the development said.  The move comes at a time when Indian drug makers are still trying to improve the quality of their facilities that have been flagged by foreign regulators such as US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) over the years.  ET has reviewed parts of CDSCO's proposal....

PTI Jan 14, 2018, 12.34 PM Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Sunday launched options trading in guarseed on the commodity bourse NCDEX and asserted that the new initiative will benefit farmers and ensure better prices in the coming days. Higher production has led to fall in prices of some agri-commodities in some places, he said, adding that options trading is one of the major steps towards taking farmers out of this situation. NCDEX is the second exchange after MCX to launch options trading in commodities. In October 2017, MCX had launched gold options. Guarseed is the first agri-commodity options. Options are derivatives which give a buyer the right but not the obligation to buy or sell an underlying asset or instrument at a specific price on or before a certain date. "I hope this initiative will provide a huge benefit to farmers in the coming days," Jaitley said at the launch event. Lauding the contribution of farmers, he said they have left ...

NEW DELHI, JANUARY 14:   Noted development economist Jean Dreze has pitched for more inclusive and active social policies in India, saying even a high rate of economic growth has failed to improve the quality of life of a large section of people in the country. Dreze also expressed concern over widespread underemployment and stagnating wages, which according to him, reflected ‘lopsidedness of economic growth in India.’ “What is even more worrying is that relatively fast economic growth continues to go hand in hand with sluggish improvements in people’s living conditions and the quality of life. Addressing this requires not only more inclusive growth but also more active social policies,” Dreze told  PTI  in an interview. Dreze, a former member of the former UPA government’s National Advisory Council, said that had India’s economic growth been more labour-intensive then the country would have seen an increase in real wages, and possibly an increase in women’...

NEW DELHI, JANUARY 14:   Looking to bring a wave of labour reforms this year, the government will push its first labour code — Wage Code Bill — in the forthcoming budget session which would enable it to set benchmark minimum wage for different regions. “Wage Code Bill will be the first labour code which would be pushed for passage in the budget session. Labour Ministry is expecting Parliament’s select committee to table the bill in the budget session beginning by the end of this month,” a source said. The draft Code on Wages Bill 2017 was introduced in the Lok Sabha in August 2017. Thereafter, it was referred to the select committee for scrutiny. The bill seeks to combine Payment of Wages Act, 1936, the Minimum Wages Act, 1949, the Payment of Bonus Act, 1965, and the Equal Remuneration Act, 1976, into one code. Minimum wages, ease of compliance The Ministry of Labour and Employment aims to combine over 44 labour laws into four broad codes in wages, industrial rel...