-The Hindu The political scientist on the danger to India’s checks and balances, and the perils of the democratisation of mediocrity in universities Professor of political Science and a holder of the Madan Lal Sobti Chair, Devesh Kapur has been director of the Center for the Study of Contemporary India at University of Pennsylvania since 2006. Mr. Kapur, who recently co-edited Public Institutions in India: Performance and Design, says our public universities...

-Business Standard Says over Rs 32,000-crore released to insurers from 2011-16 without verification of beneficiaries The crop insurance continues to be a problematic area despite the Centre launching the much-touted Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) from Kharif 2016 replacing two old schemes with no or marginal increase in coverage of non-loanee farmers, lower sum insured as compared to scale of finance and delayed claim settlement which defeated the very purpose of...

-Hindustan Times The CSE report shows that insurance companies had only settled 32.45% of the claims made till April 2017. New Delhi: An independent evaluation of the Modi government’s much-touted crop insurance scheme has showed that insurers gained nearly Rs 10,000 crore in gross profit during the last kharif season, from June to November 2016. However, it settled less than a third of the crop-loss claims filed till early this year. The report released...

-The Hindu Business Line New Delhi: India’s flagship national agricultural insurance programme — Pradhan Mantri Fazal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) — is found seriously wanting in its implementation at ground level, New Delhi-based Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) said on Friday. “PMFBY is a classic case of poor implementation of a good scheme,” said Chandra Bhushan, CSE deputy director, at a meeting here. This is because at the State level, PMFBY vision...

-Centre for Science and Environment New Delhi: Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) released here today the first detailed independent evaluation and analysis of the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) – government’s flagship national agricultural insurance programme. Across the world, agriculture insurance is recognised as an important part of the safety net for farmers to deal with the impacts of extreme and unseasonal weather due to climate change. Releasing the report...