-The Financial Express   With the High Level Committee (HLC) on restructuring FCI pointing to a 47% leakage in the 55 million tonnes of grain distributed through ration shops, the only viable solution is to shut down the PDS as the HLC has recommended be done over a period of time. Not surprisingly, many have argued that, in states that have restructured their ration shop operations-such as Chhattisgarh-there has been a dramatic...

-Governance Now Shanta Kumar committee recommendation to curtail PDS based on "motivated data fudging" A group of economists have challenged the government move to scale down the ambit of the food security initiative, arguing that leakages in the public distribution system (PDS) are not as bad as an official committee has concluded. A ‘high-level committee on restructuring of FCI', headed by Shanta Kumar, submitted its report to prime minister Narendra Modi last month,...

-The Financial Express Bihar, Chhattisgarh and Odisha have reported sharp falls in grain leakages through public distribution system (PDS) during the period between 2004-05 and 2011-12, according to an assessment by development economists Jean Dreze and Reetika Khera. In Chhattisgarh, which took several measures such as digitisation of beneficiaries lists, fair-price shops and GPS tracking of foodgrain carrying trucks, the estimated grain leakage has reduced to only 9.3% in 2011-12 from 51.8%...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Despite the botched Chhattisgarh sterilization the number of women who underwent sterilization surgery increased by 36% even as male sterilizations dropped to below 25% last year. According to health ministry data accessed through RTI the number of female sterilizations has increased from 30.22 lakh in 2012-2013 to 41.28 lakh in 2013-2014. Male sterilizations-which were already low-dropped further from 1.20 lakh to 91,652 in the same period. A...

-The Indian Express New Delhi: Bihar, along with Chhattisgarh and Orissa, have recorded the highest improvement among all states in the operations of their public distribution system (PDS), measured by the extent of grain leakages taking place. Development economists Jean Dreze and Reetika Khera estimate that only 9.3 per cent of the foodgrains channeled through Chhattisgarh's PDS network failed to reach the intended consumers in 2011-12. This is a substantial reduction relative...