-The Telegraph New Delhi: Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh Badal has asked the central government to increase wages under the national rural job scheme to at least Rs 300 a day to attract workers, a view apparently shared by many states as well as activists. An official in the rural development ministry said many state governments had already written to the Centre citing difficulties in implementing the MGNREGA because of the low...

-The Indian Express Planting fruit-bearing trees specific to the region can aid revenue generation The road ministry has finalised a “green highways” policy to “tree-line” 140,000 kilometres of national highways. Under this policy, one per cent of the civil cost of national highway development projects will have to be set aside for the planting of trees in a planned manner, covering both existing NH sections and new routes that would be added...

-IPS News TIKAMGARH: Eighty-year-old Chenabai Kushwaha sits on a charpoy under a neem tree in the village of Chitawar, located in the Tikamgarh district in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, staring intently at a dictaphone. “Please sing a song for us,” urges the woman holding the voice recorder. Kushwaha obliges with a melancholy tune about an eight-year-old girl begging her father not to give her away in marriage. The melody melts...

-The Telegraph   Tribal ministry to cover 6 lakh children of indigenous communities in Assam     Guwahati: The Union tribal affairs ministry, with the help of the health department, is planning to cover at least six lakh tribal children in Assam, including those of tea garden workers, under its sickle-cell anaemia screening programme this year. Sickle-cell anaemia is a blood disorder characterised by an abnormality in haemoglobin that carries oxygen from the lungs to...

-The Hindu Business Line The recent devastation of crops shows that the Indian economy continues to be a ‘gamble’ on the rain. But can India Meteorological Department’s new model make it predictable? Moisture wrecks a farmer's life. Since February this year, lakhs of farmers across 14 states were left with damaged crops. Unseasonal rains destroyed crops on 11 million hectares spread over Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Punjab....