-Scroll.in Instead, for a start, we should allow forests to regrow naturally. Planting trees creates a plantation, not a forest. India is again wasting valuable time, effort and resources on a national scale as it races to forestall an impending water crisis. The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change is conducting massive afforestation drives, planting native species. But a forest is a self-sown, self-regenerating community of plants and dependent organisms, from...

-Centre for Financial Accountability blog The institution of Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) in India is patterned on the British model. In Britain, The Exchequer & Audit Department Act of 1866 created the office of CAG with a view to strengthen democracy and exercise parliamentary Control over national finances. The office of CAG came into being, thanks to the missionary zeal of William Gladstone who was Finance Minister at the time...

-PTI Only one out of 39 locations through which the Ganga flows had clean water in the post-monsoon period this year, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) has said in its latest study. As many as 37 of the 41 locations through which the river flows reported moderate to severe water pollution in the pre-monsoon period, according to the ‘Biological Water Quality Assessment of the River Ganga (2017-18)’ report that was recently...

-The Hindu Business Line Govt announces Rs. 2/kg subsidy to farmers who were selling their produce at low prices Mumbai: In a relief to the distressed onion growers in Maharashtra, the Fadnavis government on Thursday decided to provide ?2 per kg subsidy on the bulbs sold from November 1 till December 15 in the State. About three lakh farmers stand to gain up to Rs.40,000 from this decision by the State government. The money,...

-Down to Earth The scheme's Management Information System destroys local accountability, promotes centralisation and administrative Control and gives out wrong data There is an increasing tendency in the Union government to show performances of central schemes, especially social welfare programmes, through data captured by the Management Information System (MIS). It is indeed a matter of astonishment how the MIS data always shows high performances of schemes and programmes, while ground surveys and...