-The Times of India NEW DELHI: An expert committee under chief economic advisor Raghuram Rajan has identified 10 parameters for a new Composite Development Index, whose adoption by the Centre will change the way thousands of crores are transferred annually and can potentially set the stage for realignment of political forces in Bihar before the 2014 polls. The new index seeks to rate states on the basis of their distance from the...

The declining trend in food price inflation globally may not hold true for inflationary trends faced domestically due to a weakening Indian Rupee vis-a-vis the US Dollar. The recently released FAO Food Price Index (nominal) has shown a declining trend in July for the third consecutive month owing to lower international prices for grains, soy & palm oil, meat, dairy and sugar. (See links below) Based on FAO Food Price...

-Frontline Once more, without feeling: the government's latest poverty estimates. YET again the Central government has mired itself in controversy by releasing its latest poverty estimates based on the consumption expenditure survey of the NSSO (National Sample Survey Office) Survey of 2011-12. The Planning Commission's poverty line, using methodology suggested by the Tendulkar Committee in 2010, is now apparently defined as the spending of Rs. 27.20 per capita per day in rural...

-DNA With the union cabinet approving a proposal to amend the RTI Act to keep political parties out of its purview, the controversy about six national political parties having been declared "public authorities" by the CIC has taken a rather serious turn. Political parties, acting though Parliament, are on the verge of undoing a law that Parliament itself had given to the nation. The argument that the law should apply to...

-Tehelka.com The Sen-Bhagwati ‘debate' on economic policy is focussing on the wrong issues Several things are quite remarkable about the recent debate between Professor Amartya Sen and Professor Jagdish Bhagwati. The first surprise is that such a debate could become a major news item at all, making headlines and filling screen time on news channels, when it is about economic strategies that are normally discussed only in relatively small academic and policy...