-The Hindu Allow more flexibility at the ground level, says internal study commissioned by the Ministry of Rural Development An internal study commissioned by the Ministry of Rural Development has argued for decentralisation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), allowing for more “flexibility” at the ground level.  The Ministry recently made public the report of the sixth Common Review Mission which surveyed seven States — Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh,...

-TheWire.in The Narela industrial complex is one of the biggest in Asia, packed with booming small-scale industrial units. It runs entirely on the labour of low-income workers who have very little say on their pay and living conditions. In order to start liberalising trade and industrial production capacity through economic policy, the Indian nation-state began implementing a set of Washington Consensus style neo-liberal economic reforms in the early 1990s. The liberalisation push across...

-The Hindu Over past 10 days, the Balangir police have prevented 500 workers from migrating to other States KANTABANJI (ODISHA): Juta Majhi was just a few kilometres away from the Kantabanji railway station in Odisha when the Balangir district police intercepted him last week. Mr. Majhi, 38, a resident of Badibahal under the Khaprakhol police station in the district, and his family members were planning to board a train to Karnataka and travel...

-The Telegraph About 20 workers would come to the work site every day, get photographed for attendance carrying basketfuls of soil or digging the earth, and then leave without doing any real work New Delhi: This summer, Gaudsahi village under Kapileswarpur gram panchayat in Odisha’s Puri district began renovating the village pond under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural employment Guarantee Act. About 20 workers would come to the work site every day, get...

-TheWire.in If governments wish to raise employment levels in formal sector enterprises and prepare school leavers for the world of work, it is critical that systems of internships and apprenticeships, formally approved and mandated, are encouraged.  In the vast majority of low-income and middle-income countries (LICs/MICs), most students at the secondary/higher secondary level are engaged in general academic education, not vocational education or training. For such students, the transition to the world of...