-PTI   Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, the head of the Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM) on Food, has approved key changes in the proposed National Food Security Bill and the revised draft will be placed before Cabinet soon. ”Yesterday evening, the Finance Minister has given final clearance to the draft Food Bill. It will be soon placed before Cabinet,” told Food Minister K V Thomas. The key changes proposed in the Bill have been...

Are smaller states easier to govern and hence better for the people? The most recent reorganization took place in November 2000 when three mega states - Uttar Pradesh,Bihar and Madhya Pradesh - were sliced up to give birth to Uttarakhand, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh, respectively. It is more than a decade since then. The new states are now well-established. But, how are they faring compared to the 'mother' states? Has the...

The promotion of the PDS as an Aadhaar application would fundamentally alter its form and character. NO scheme of the Indian government would be transformed more fundamentally by Aadhaar than the public distribution system (PDS). The nature of this transformation appears to be taking the form of a virtual dismantling of the PDS; even if a skeletal fair price shop (FPS, or ration shop) system continues to exist, it is likely...

Sivadasan's five-acre farm used to be a solitary patch in Kerala's Palakkad district, with bitter gourd, cucumber, cow peas and lady's finger growing amid a landscape dotted with paddy fields and plantations of rubber and spices.  Just five years later, more than 1.45 lakh farmers in the southern state have joined Sivadasan and started growing vegetables, reflecting a palpable shift sweeping across the Indian countryside.  "Vegetables are always more profitable than paddy,"...

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today said rising prices of fuel were a reality Indians needed to deal with as any more subsidies in the oil sector could destabilise the economy. The comment came days after Mamata Banerjee, his biggest ally at the Centre, warned that her Trinamul Congress would quit the ruling UPA if prices of kerosene, diesel and cooking gas were raised. Asked what he thought of the Bengal chief minister’s...