-The Central Chronicle   On an experimental basis, mobile banking services have been introduced in eight districts of the state to disburse wages to labourers in their villages itself under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS). There are plans to expand mobile banking services to remaining 42 districts. Under the plan, wages amounting to more than Rs. 74 crore have been paid to over two lakh 75 thousand labourers...

-PTI   The government’s flagship rural job guarantee scheme is innovative and has achieved quite high coverage but faces challenges like uneven implementation across states and “some evidence” of leakage of funds, a new World Bank report says. The study ‘Social Protection for a Changing India’ also says ensuring higher degree of awareness among people about the process of applying for work under the scheme and a strong monitoring and evaluation system...

What is rural and what is urban is largely an artefact of definition and relative. See the table below. Most of India's 'rural' population resides in villages that contain between 500 and 5,000 inhabitants. Some argue that in other countries, many of these villages would be classified as urban. These studies point out that if India were to be a little more liberal in its definition of urban areas (minimum...

Blames FCI’s internal bureaucracy for resisting reforms Much to the dismay of several NGOs that want strengthening of the public distribution system (PDS) in India, the World Bank in its latest report has favoured cash transfers. “In the medium to long term, the report recommends offering households the option of a cash transfer while continuing food-based support for specific situations…,” the bank said in the report titled ‘Social Protection for a Changing...

The government is exploring whether it can use the biometric smart cards issued for its flagship health insurance scheme to stop misappropriation of funds under its rural employment scheme. The rural development ministry is in talks with the labour ministry to use the biometric smart cards issued for the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY) for identifying beneficiaries of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS). "I have seen truck drivers...