-The Indian Express The government on Tuesday informed the Lok Sabha about the expansion of the scope of activities permitted under the rural job guarantee scheme by including 30 new activities. These will supplement agricultural and animal husbandry operations along with flood management and sanitation-related works in rural India. According to the copy of the government notification put before the Lok Sabha on Tuesday, the government has amended Schedule-I and Schedule-II of...

Just in case our friends in the media were looking for more evidence, a new ILO report clinches the connection between old age pension and a country’s well being. The ILO report “World Social Security Report 2010/11: Providing coverage in times of crisis and beyond” puts India’s social security coverage in perspective of its peers. (the report can be accessed at http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---dgreports/---dcomm/---publ/documents/publication/wcms_146566.pdf.  India is not only nearly at the bottom...

-The Pioneer The super-vision mission team of World Bank, with the help of District Poverty Initiatives Project, appreciated the self-confidence, vision and awareness of rural women trying to earn their livelihood. Through innovative initiative of the project, team members spread awareness about the solar energy lantern and mobile charging stations among the rural people. The establishment of solar energy lantern and mobile charging stations is being done through regeneration committee set up...

-The Hindu Jairam to write to Prime Minister seeking more coverage The demand for universal pension for elderly persons got a fillip with President Pratibha Patil on Thursday extending her support and Union Minister for rural Development Jairam Ramesh deciding to write to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to restructure the pension scheme to cover more beneficiaries. Ms. Patil made a personal contribution of Rs. 15,000 to the Pension Parishad which is staging a...

-The Hindu The Centre on Tuesday unveiled the expanded version of the Mahatma Gandhi National rural Employment Guarantee Act, allowing over 30 new permissible works, as productivity-enhancing activity. The gram panchayats alone have been empowered to decide on the priority of work to be taken up. Union Minister for rural Development Jairam Ramesh, who tabled in Parliament a copy of the new notification, and Planning Commission member Mihir Shah told reporters that...