-PTI   Food minister KV Thomas said that apart from raising foodgrains production, the country needs modern storage facilities on the lines of China to sustain the implementation of new food bill provisions.  The draft National Food Security Bill, which is likely to be introduced in the winter session of Parliament, seeks to provide legal entitlement to subsidised foodgrains to 75 per cent of the country's rural population and 50 per cent of...

“There is never enough rice to go around for the whole family,” says tribal woman Leela   With a handful of grain and a head full of recipes, Leela cooks rice in a pot balanced on three stones in a room with a few bricks knocked out to let in sunlight in this village barely 150 km from Raipur, Chhattisgarh capital. When rice is scarce, she adds more water to make a broth,...

The Planning Commission's poverty straightjacket is but one of a series of obstacles faced by “aspirants” to the BPL status. Nothing illustrates the absurdity of current food policies more poignantly than the plight of Dablu Singh's family in Latehar district, Jharkhand. About two years ago Dablu, a young Adivasi who survived mainly from casual labour, fell from a roof at work and broke his back. He is paralysed for life and...

-The Hindustan Times   Do these people look well-off to you? The planning commission puts them above poverty line. Basant Kumar, 51  Shopkeeper  Kusumpur Pahari slum,  Vasant Vihar, Delhi Daily expense: Rs 53   Basant Kumar runs a little shop in a slum in Vasant Vihar, home to over two lakh migrant families. He feeds and clothes his wife and three children on his meagre earnings of Rs5,000 a month. He also works odd-jobs, in construction or with...

Expected to clarify Planning Commission's stand on the issue today Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia on Sunday called on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in the wake of the controversy over the Commission's Rs. 32 per capita per day definition of poverty line. He is expected to clarify the Commission's stand on the issue on Monday. The controversy broke out after an affidavit was filed by the Commission in the Supreme...