-The Hindu Chennai needs integrated flood management, especially the revival of lakes and water tanks Chennai’s date with a strong northeast monsoon ought to be a cause for all-round relief since the water fortunes of more than eight million residents of the metropolitan region depend on this weather system. Yet, the torrential rains in the meteorological sub-division, exceeding the normal by 93% in the period of four days from November 1, left...

-Down to Earth Even after an order by the Supreme Court, the government has not released the payments The flagship scheme for rural employment generation, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), is facing severe fund crunch this year, resulting in unpaid dues of Rs 3,066 crore in wage payments in 19 states. Around 87 per cent of the scheme’s budget for this year has already by exhausted. A civil...

-TheWire.in The government should keep the secretary of the health department unchanged for three years for him/her to be able to show results. But that has not been happening. The NDA government had promised good governance and policy stability. Yet we have a fourth secretary in the health department in the last three years – the seventh in the last seven years. Since both the outgoing and the incoming officers have sterling...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The government has instructed states not to deny benefits under the public distribution system to beneficiaries who don't have Aadhaar numbers or haven't linked their ration cards to the biometric identifier, the directive coming after a Jharkhand girl's recent death from alleged starvation. It has also asked State Governments not to delete eligible households from the list of PDS beneficiaries for non-possession of Aadhaar cards and warned of...

-Livemint.com The draft guidelines propose to levy a new water conservation fee based on quantum of groundwater extracted With the aim of completely changing the way groundwater is managed, the central government has proposed guidelines which stipulate that all industries, mining and infrastructure dewatering projects—whether existing or new—that draw or propose to draw groundwater will now need to obtain a no-objection certificate (NOC). The draft guidelines, reviewed by Mint, also propose to levy...