If reports as appearing in a section of the local media are to be believed, several crores of funds under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) have been siphoned off “under the DAN government”. Detailed charges have been put up by the Nagaland Pradesh Congress Committee (NPCC) against the large scale misuse of public fund under the MGNREGA by the present ‘DAN government”. The charges have been...

Global business abhors uncertainty. The ministerial-level corruption in UPA-II has slowed FDI and FII inflows. The stock market, despite double-digit corporate profit and 8.6% GDP growth, reflects the anxiety of Indian and foreign investors. To take India's growth story forward in the 20th year of economic reforms, political reforms must catch up. Misgovernance won't do in a globalised, interconnected world. Two kinds of political corruption blight India: episodical and ongoing. Episodical...

The Embassy cable suggests a serious crime was committed on Indian soil to which U.S. diplomats were privy. The Prime Minister cannot cite lame arguments to justify inaction. Since politics is a distraction, consider the following retelling of the WikiLeaks tale. An activist dies in a traffic accident. CCTV footage from a bank nearby suggests he might have been murdered but the case is never investigated properly. Three years later,...

Corruption in implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) in UP may be another point of tussle between the state and Central governments, already at loggerheads over various issues. After getting no exact response from the state government over repeated queries regarding the action taken against officials, responsible for financial irregularities committed in the implementation of the scheme, the Centre has warned of seeking help of the...

Two weeks after Neyamat Ansari, a close associate of national employment guarantee scheme (NREGS) governing council member Jean Dreze, was beaten to death in Jharkhand, the Centre added on Thursday a new section to the act to force state governments to take action against irregularities in the programme. “If the Centre directs the state government for taking steps for effective implementation of the provisions of the act and the states do...