A year before assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, the Planning Commission has ranked the state poorly on performance of 12 major flagship schemes of the Central government. The new analysis is likely to provide Congress ammunition against the Mayawati government on UP for not been able to utilize the Central government funds effectively. The new ranking, which is the part of annual state plan report for 2011-12, finds UP at the bottom...

-The Economic Times   It's promising to be a tumultous kharif sowing season notwithstanding the massive food grain stocks with the government which is forcing down farmer produce prices countrywide. Early arrival of a forecast normal to good monsoon should have ordinarily enthused farmers to increase the acreage under key summer sown crops this season. But, in protest against the Centre's persisting anti-farmer policies, small and marginal farmers in some villages...

-The Economic Times   The Meghalaya government today cautioned that some false job letters were being distributed in the state in the name of the Union Rural Development Ministry to mislead job seekers. "Some vested interests are circulating false job offers purportedly issued by the Project Director, Srimati Indu Sarma, New Delhi, where the letter head carries the National Emblem and the name of MGNREGA Act 2005, Ministry of Rural Development, Government...

How effective are India's innumerable social security programmes at reaching out to the poorest of the poor? If a recent World Bank report is anything to go by, they are woefully inefficient. According to the report, titled "Social Protection for a Changing India", leakages and exclusion errors are endemic across the country. For instance, just 27% of the PDS . beenficiaries are the poorest of the poor. The World Bank found...

-The Times of India   A day before UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi's visit to the tribal belt of the state, chief minister Ashok Gehlot and Union minister C P Joshi reviewed the preparations at Banswara and Dungarpur. Sonia would be on a day's visit to Banswara to launch the Centre's flagship rural self-employment programme and lay the foundation stone of the long-awaited ambitious Dungarpur-Banswara-Ratlam rail line project in Dungarpur district. UPA...