-The Tribune The Centre for Equity Studies, Delhi, conducted a survey to gauge the impact of the switch to cash transfers on the consumption patterns of the poor in Chandigarh. The preference for kind vis-a-vis cash transfers was recorded. Importantly, public opinion found no place in the decision- making process. Feroza Begum had to make a choice between food security and her children's education. Allow me to rephrase it: Feroza Begum had...

-Business Standard Petroleum ministry went through the list of consumers in affluent areas to find only 3% earning over Rs 10 lakh/year had surrendered their cooking gas subsidy The government is monitoring people earning over Rs 10 lakh a year who have not given up their cooking gas subsidy. Income tax data was being examined in affluent areas, Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan told Business Standard. This year's Economic Survey said Rs 1 lakh...

-Press Release from Delhi Pension Parishad Activists from seven major campaigns stated unequivocally that the Union Budget for 2016-17 far from ‘Transforming India’, as claimed by the Finance Minister, Shri Arun Jaitley, is neglecting the interests of farmers, the poor and vulnerable both in nominal and real terms and subjecting every life-affirming program to severe  budget cuts. Activists from seven major campaigns such as the Right to Food Campaign , the...

-Livemint.com Three questions can help understand whether the budget has enough wherewithal to provide a big rural stimulus New Delhi: The government has given enough signals that the distress-ridden rural sector would receive special focus in the forthcoming Budget. On Monday, a Mint report quoted senior officials in the agriculture ministry saying that there could be a significant increase in budgetary allocations for crop insurance and irrigation. But in the backdrop...

-Livemint.com Overall, we find that social sector investments have in fact increased across all states, except Bihar In February 2015, the Government of India accepted the Fourteenth Finance Commission’s (FFC) recommendation to empower states with greater expenditure discretion. The states’ share in Union taxes, therefore, increased from 32% to 42%. While the move holds the promise to reform India’s centralized, one-size-fits-all approach to financing the social sector, the process adopted by...