The global economic slowdown may pinch the poor in India. The Planning Commission is redrawing its projections for the 12th five year plan (2012-17) in wake of current global economic situation and could end up scaling down money for welfare schemes. Health, education and rural development are not expected to get the hike they had sought and allocations for some other ministries are likely to fall, prompted by a lower growth. The...

After the public outcry over the controversial Rs 28 a day poverty formulation, the Planning Commission has put the poverty debate in a deep freeze with the government setting up yet another expert group to take a relook at the existing methodology to determine the number of poor in the country. The decision, taken under public pressure, can be interpreted as rejection of the Tendulkar Committee report based on which the...

The Planning Commission has distanced itself from the government's decision to appoint a committee to reconsider the way poverty numbers are estimated, indicating a deep divide between the political masters and the technocrats at institution charged with laying down development agenda for the country. On Thursday, Minister for Planning Ashwini Kumar announced a committee under C Rangarajan, chairman of prime minister's economic advisory council, to review the widely criticised poverty estimates released...

-The Telegraph The government today set up an expert committee to suggest a new methodology for determining who is poor and who is not, following widespread condemnation of its existing criteria last year. However, the five-member committee headed by C. Rangarajan, chairman of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council, will also examine the existing methodology, which was suggested by a previous expert panel formed under Suresh Tendulkar. Tendulkar’s methodology was solely based on...

-IANS The government on Thursday set up a technical panel to review the Tendulkar Committee methodology for deciding the poverty line for which it has under increasing criticism in recent months.  The technical group panel headed by the Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council Chairman C. Rangarajan will "revisit the methodology for estimation of the poverty and identification of the poor," the Planning Commission said in a statement.  Based on the methodologies suggested by...