Free healthcare at state-of-the-art hospitals will soon be within reach of even those with meagre resources. The Jharkhand chapter of National Rural Health Mission is mulling a massive tie up with public sector units to provide free medical care to over 25 lakh people of the state who are living below the poverty line. State mission director Aradhana Patnaik, confirming the development, informed that major PSUs operating out of Jharkhand, including CCL,...
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Cash transfers and food insecurity by Kannan Kasturi
Distribution of basic food grains and fuel at controlled prices every month through the Public Distribution System (PDS) could be the largest service provided by the Indian State, touching as it does over 65 million families through a network of nearly half a million retail shops. Given that the urban middle class has little stake in the health of the PDS, there have to be some compelling reasons for the...
More »Centre plans to rid capital of its slums by Mahendra Kumar Singh
Union housing ministry on Monday pledged to make the capital slum -free within a stipulated timeframe. The drive is part of UPA-II’s ambitious initiative of Rajeev Awas Yojana (RAY), which aims to create a slum-free India. A high-profile meeting — called by housing minister Kumai Selja and attended by Delhi chief minister Sheila Dixit — decided to chart out an action plan for a slum-free Delhi. Sources said it was decided...
More »PHCs in State to be better equipped by S Rajendran
Number of centres to be frozen There are nearly 2,300 PHCs in the State Freezing the number will help improve the PHCs Ten of the 30 districts in the State have very poor healthcare services while an equal number of districts have good facilities. Given the need to streamline the system, the State Government has decided to freeze the number of Primary Health Centres (PHCs) and utilise the available funds for improving the...
More »Universalization of food security law may take a hit, shows survey by Subodh Ghildiyal & Rajeev Deshpande
A pilot survey finding that 25-30% of the rural population can be automatically excluded from food security entitlements for below poverty line population might help forge a consensus between the government and the Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council. The "automatic exclusion" criteria, devised on the basis of the N C Saxena report on methodology for a BPL census, is more liberal than the "bare bones" approach adopted by the government in...
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