-The Hindu Business Line   Perpetual growth is a piece of nonsense. The focus should be on protecting livelihoods through sustainable means Construct a building, demolish it, reconstruct, break it down again, and go on repeating this meaningless exercise. You will have economic growth, as currently measured. But no net gain in employment during the endless cycle of construction and demolition, no net increase in productive capacity, and no appreciable change in poverty...

-The Hindustan Times In what could be a relief to Janata Dal (United) leader Nitish Kumar, the C Rangarajan panel on poverty estimation report has said that in Bihar the poverty ratios dipped by over one-third in just two years between 2009-10 and 2011-12 - much greater than any other state in India. Kumar had resigned as Bihar chief minister after receiving drubbing at the hands of the BJP-led...

-The Pioneer Citing security reasons, State Governments have rejected the Centre's proposal to dole out cash to the MGNREGA beneficiaries in the villages having poor network of internet or banks and post offices in the country. Sources in the Union Rural Development Ministry, which is executing the MGNREGA scheme, said that the Central Government had recently asked the States to identify 800-1,000 blocks where rural job workers have not been able...

-The Hindustan Times Nearly one in three Indians was poor in 2011-12, according to a new report that was commissioned following widespread criticism two years ago that the government grossly underestimated the number of poor in the country by choosing an unrealistic poverty line for such estimates. The panel, headed by former RBI governor C Rangarajan who also was the chairman of the prime minister's economic advisory council in the UPA government,...

-The Hindu   With water becoming an important cost, and with climate change and soil degradation, the System of Rice Intensification offers disadvantaged farming households better opportunities A truant monsoon is in the offing, with El Niño weather patterns expected to bring about drier conditions. India has the world's largest area devoted to rice, a very water-intensive crop. This is a good time for giving impetus to "more crop per drop" practices, now...