-The Hindu Revenues from appropriately charging personal transport can make public transport cheap Women may soon get to travel for free on buses and Metro trains in Delhi. This gender-based public transport fare subsidy programme, announced by the Aam Aadmi Party government, has not been tested anywhere in India in the past. Proponents claim that the policy will protect and liberate women. Critics argue that it is financially unviable and unfair. As...

-Down to Earth Farmers and farm labourers, who want to quit agriculture, are stuck in the non-remunerative work since other sectors are not generating jobs at the required rate We are fairly sure by now that the upcoming Budget would be the first government instrument towards the prime minister’s ambitious plan of making India a $5 trillion economy by 2024. Currently, India is nearly a $2.8 trillion economy. It is obvious we...

-IndiaSpend.com Mumbai: As 128 children died of encephalitis in Bihar over 19 days to June 21, 2019, a new study reports that the state’s rural population prefers government investment in public healthcare over roads, jobs and cash transfers. In a survey conducted by the Brookings Institution, an American research group, in an administrative block of Bihar, 3,800 respondents--comprising the poor, less-educated and disadvantaged caste groups--were asked to make a choice: an incremental...

-The Hindu Narendra Modi must leverage the public trust voters have placed in him to get the economy on track Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s election campaign, staying clear of bread-and-butter issues, successfully swayed voter attention away from economic hardships. Having won a thumping mandate, his government in its second tenure must now devote itself to a well-thought-out strategy for economic reforms. The bad news Official estimates released on Friday, the new government’s first day...

-The Hindu The merger of the NSSO into the Central Statistics Office is a cause for concern The announcement that the government has decided to merge the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) into and under the Central Statistics Office (CSO) has caused both surprise and concern. What exactly the ‘merger’ means remains unclear. Recent attempts to question the veracity of National Sample Survey (NSS) data and the way the issue has been...