While there is all-round concern about how the NREGA funds are being utilised at the grass-roots level, the Union rural development ministry has initiated the process of inducting technology to streamline the delivery system under NREGA. This will have a revolutionary impact on programme delivery. With about 50 million people working on site in 2,50,000 panchayats all across the country, the magnitude of the task is daunting. However, once the initial...
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My data versus yours by MK Venu
It’s been often asked why our officialdom, with all the intellectual capital at its command, is unable to quantify the number of the really poor in India. Is this such a difficult thing to do? It is all the more baffling because in recent times, the debate on India’s poverty has only further confounded ordinary citizens. The Planning Commission had come up with an assumed deprivation ratio of 27.5 per...
More »The next frontier is rural net penetration
A seven-state survey on rural internet awareness revealed that close to 84% were ignorant of the medium’s existence. Of the ones who did know about it, 85% used the net only to access emails, 13% to know about the latest farming techniques and 8% to look up fertilisers, among other uses. We can acknowledge that internet penetration so far has been weak; but the past is not a guide to...
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KEY TRENDS • Maternal Mortality Ratio for India was 370 in 2000, 286 in 2005, 210 in 2010, 158 in 2015 and 145 in 2017. Therefore, the MMRatio for the country decreased by almost 61 percent between 2000 and 2017 *14 • As per the NSS 71st round, among rural females aged 5-29 years, the main reasons for dropping out/ discontinuance were: engagement in domestic activities, not interested in education, financial constraints and marriage. Among rural males aged...
More »Govt gives free phones to poor instead of grains by Swati Vashishtha
Over 1000 Below Poverty Line (BPL) card holders in Rajasthan, got free cell phones, instead of the free food grains. It seemed the UPA Government would rather let the food grains rot in open than distribute them for free to the poor. The Government felt it more important to distribute cell phones to the poor in Minister of State for Communication and Information Technology Sachin Pilot's constituency of Ajmer. People of Phagi...
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