Funds allocated for the United Progressive Alliance government’s flagship rural welfare scheme, although the highest for any single social welfare programme, are enough to meet only about half its objective, says a report by a legislative panel. The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) guarantees at least 100 days of work a year for one member of every poor rural household. The parliamentary standing committee on rural development, which assessed...
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India to brief G-20 on its successful rural scheme by Lalit K Jha
Union Labour Minister Mallikarjun Kharge would present a briefing on the country''s highly successful National Rural Employment Generation Scheme at the first ever meet of G-20 labour ministers here today. Top officials from the US Department of Labour, organisers of the event, said the innovative 100-day rural employment guarantee scheme has been successful beyond the expectations of almost every one. "India has learnt and has refined the strategy. So there is...
More »Sonia effect? Plan panel raises BPL Bar by Nitin Sethi & Mahendra Kumar Singh
The uncertainty over the number of people to benefit from the proposed food security law has abated. With Sonia Gandhi in her new role as National Advisory Council chairperson keeping a vigil, the Planning Commission on Saturday dropped its reluctance to accept Tendulkar committee's report putting the size of the below poverty line (BPL) population at 37.2%. The Planning Commission had so far been keen on going with its own...
More »How to feed your billionaires by P Sainath
Freebies for the IPL — at a time of savage food subsidy cuts for the poor — benefit four men who make the Forbes Billionaire List of 2010 and a few other, mere multi-millionaires. And so the IPL fracas is now heading for its own Champions League. Union Cabinet Ministers, Union Ministers of State, Chief Ministers (and who knows a Governor or two might pop up yet) are being named...
More »Hunger helps Maoists spread their wings by B Vijay Murty
If you want to understand why the Maoists grow stronger, watch frail Shyam Charan Kisku, 5, as he keeps hunger away by nibbling at a wild berry called Kendu on a hot April afternoon. Kisku and 40-odd children in this scraggly village of mud-and-thatch homes, 180km south-east of Jharkhand’s capital Ranchi, did not get their free lunch this day under the national mid-day meal scheme, the world’s largest cooked-meal programme. Kisku’s mother,...
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