-The Times of India In the decade or so that i was at the Planning Commission, i always had advisory responsibility for the food ministry/public distribution system, among other issues of development policy. It did not take very long to find out that the fundamental problem with the system was about so-called "leakages" abetted by corruption: One soon learnt that the Food Corporation of India (FCI) was one of the most...

-The Business Standard But RTI is not the tool to impose transparency on parties There is no doubt that much is wrong with how elections in India are financed. In India, as in most democratic countries, the need for political funding is often what causes cronyism and outright corruption - in fact, more than one politician, cutting across party lines, is on record making this argument. It is necessary, certainly, to introduce...

-Frontline Despite the negative observations and criticisms, there is a strong case for MGNREGS works to be continued even in States with high per capita incomes. Hisar and Fatehabad: CONTRARY to general opinion, demand for work under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) is high in Haryana. Contrary also to the views in recent discussion papers, one of them commissioned by the Commission for Agricultural Cost and Prices...

-The Indian Express Bringing political parties under RTI is a bad, and anti-political, idea In a radical ruling, the chief information commissioner has decided that political parties should be open to scrutiny under the right to information. Six national parties have been asked to appoint officers to handle requests, and proactively share information about their finances and voluntary contributions, including donor information. The logic is that parties get public land and offices,...

-Press Release of Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) On 3rd of June 2013, a full bench of Central Information Commission (CIC) comprising of Chief Information Commissioner Shri. Satyananda Mishra and Information Commissioners Shri. M.L. Sharma and Smt. Annapurna Dixit gave a landmark judgment where they ruled in favor of bringing Political Parties under the ambit of Right to Information Act (RTI). In October 2010, Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) filed RTIs...