One man’s fiscal problem is another man’s lifeline. Trigger happy bureaucrats and economists may love shooting down subsidies because it bloats the fiscal deficit and burdens the government but the simple fact is that in a one billion strong nation, in which nearly one in every three live below the poverty line, one needs an effective and efficient method through which privileged tax payers can support the poor. Last week, finance...

-The Business Standard Public discussion on falling poverty hits a new low The Lok Sabha was adjourned for a short duration on Wednesday following an uproar over the government’s latest figures for poverty. This follows widespread public outrage at those figures. A dispassionate observer of this discussion may be led to conclude that either poverty has risen dramatically or the government has somehow fudged the figures inexcusably and obviously. Elsewhere perhaps,...

-The Hindu   Liberal bail system adopted by courts Only 3.2 per cent of the people arrested for various crimes are in PRIson given the “liberal bail system” adopted by courts, according to the Bureau of Police Research and Development (BPR&D), New Delhi. Making a presentation on ‘Problems of overcrowding in PRIsons in India' at an all-India conference of DG/IG of PRIsons here on Saturday, B.V. Trivedi, Deputy Director, BPR&D, said: “As much as...

Based on the orders of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), the Puducherry government has paid Rs. 3 lakh to the wife of an undertrial PRIsoner – Silvaraj alias Siva – who died on August 15, 2009 in the Central PRIson at Kalapet (Puducherry) when he was assaulted by five inmates. The NHRC, after considering various reports, including the post-mortem and conclusions of magisterial inquiry, found that Silvaraj was admitted to...

-The Hindu   The ambitious and controversial Unique ID scheme — Aadhaar — received a double boost in this year's budget: not only did Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee sanction Rs. 1,758 crore to enrol 40 crore more residents, but Prime Minister Manmohan Singh also emphasised that the scheme would soon become the main channel through which people could access a wide variety of budget benefits. “I propose to allocate adequate funds to complete...