The Manmohan Singh government has moved in to restore the role of civil society groups in conducting the social audit of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act in an attempt to weed out corruption from various levels. The Rural Development Ministry is in consultation with the Comptroller and Auditor General to remove the lacuna that had cropped up after social audit rules were amended in 2009 to eliminate...

As government, corporates seek to engage with NGOs, they gain new significance Brave NGO World?     * The Planning Commission is courting NGOs for policy inputs, views on how to make plans work     * NGOs and local activism forced govt to stall Vedanta, Posco plans     * NGO opposition to snacks being served in schools changed plans to scrap hot meals     * NGO have made the government rethink the Polavaram dam project    ...

Thiruvoipati Nandakumar How is better delivery expected by allocating more foodgrains, when the system is not equipped to handle even the current level of allocation? The debate about the proposed national food security act seems to be centred on the magnitude of the allocation of food grains. But the issue is far beyond only foodgrains. It is about improving health, sanitation and nutrition standards so that India’s human development goals can be...

The revised daily wage for NREGS workers is still lower than the minimum wages paid in several States. A CONTROVERSY seems to have surfaced between the Prime Minister's Office and the National Advisory Council (NAC) on the issue of wages under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA). The NAC has been arguing for some time that there should be parity between wages under the National Rural Employment...

The chairman of the National Council for Teacher Education, a statutory body monitoring teachers’ education in the country, has been found guilty of corruption by a vigilance inquiry, sources said. M.A. Siddiqui is likely to be issued a chargesheet within a week. A professor from Jamia Millia Islamia University on deputation to NCTE since 2008, Siddiqui is also likely to be repatriated to the university after it wrote to the human...