-The Indian Express Incomparable data sets, cherry-picking, and dubious statistical analysis are behind the claims of robust employment growth. Only 1.4 million Jobs were added in 2017. Surjit Bhalla has invented an estimate that 15 million Jobs were created in 2017 (‘Robust job growth, not fake news,’ IE, April 28). This is an invention; it is not a discovery or an inference by honest statistical analysis. It is an invention because Bhalla...

-TheWire.in Surjit Bhalla, who draws on CMIE’s database and EPFO data, notes that job creation in 2017 was likely 15 million. New Delhi: The head of the Centre for Monitoring of Indian Economy (CMIE) has accused economist Surjit Bhalla, who is a member of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council (PMEAC), of distorting and “dishonestly presenting” its nationwide employment survey to claim that India created 15 million Jobs in 2017. The CMIE does...

-Down to Earth Waste pickers recycle almost 20 per cent of India's wastes. Yet they are unrecognised, face discrimination and are not entitled to government schemes India produces about 5.31 million tonnes of waste each year and is facing an unprecedented solid waste management crisis. Coupled with an upward trend in industrialisation, rural migration, spending and an increasing propensity for capitalist consumption, the amount of waste generated in India will continue...

-The Indian Express After the Finance Ministry rejected the recommendations of two recent government panels, MGNREGA workers in 10 states will get no raises in 2018-19. Minimum farm wages are now higher in many states. The last time the union government brought MGNREGA wages at par with minimum agricultural wages was in 2009. Two years later, in 2011, only four states — Kerala, Goa, Haryana and Mizoram — had minimum agricultural wages...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The government's spending on the rural job scheme increased 10 per cent in the last fiscal despite a matching decline in the number of beneficiaries because of deletion, challenging claims that weeding out bogus card-holders helped cut down on expenditure and pointing to the lack of Jobs in rural areas. After verification, the government struck off the names of 1.62 crore job card-holders under the Mahatma Gandhi National...