-PTI New Delhi: Maoist violence in some districts of Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Odisha and Bihar has impeded the progress of rural electrification, the Centre admitted in the Lok Sabha today. Power Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said while progress of rural electrification work in the country under Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyutikaran Yojna (rural electrification scheme) is "generally satisfactory, the progress in some states is "comparatively slow" due to law and order and Maoist violence, and...

-PTI NEW DELHI: Admitting to increased stances of rejection of food consignments by EU in the last three years, government today said it is taking steps to ensure compliance with the European norms. To a question that whether reports about increase in notifications by the European Union against food exports from India due to presence of contaminants are correct, Minister of State for Commerce D Purandeswari said: "Yes". There have been an increase...

-The Hindustan Times * What is a poverty line? The poverty line defines a threshold income. Households earning below this threshold are considered poor. Different countries have different methods of defining the threshold income depending on local socio-economic needs. * Who brings out the poverty estimates in India? The Planning Commission releases the poverty estimates in India. * How is it measured? Poverty is measured based on consumer expenditure surveys of...

-One World South Asia The mid-day meal tragedy in Bihar has drawn attention directly to the way we articulate and work for educational entitlements, writes Parvinder Singh and Priyanka Sarkar. Lucknow: It takes an informed and empowered community to harvest the fruits of educational entitlements, including non-discriminatory access to midday meals. The promises made in the Right to Education Act can only be wrested as rights when they are owned by the...

-Down to Earth Government claims a huge drop in poverty numbers but critical indicators-health, malnutrition and wages-continue to be grim. So how did the poor fare better? After a long, long time there was good news to splash as media led with the report of a record 21.9 per cent drop in poverty levels. The July 24 newspaper headlines were celebratory as they reported the Planning Commission's findings that poverty rates...