-The Hindu Notional poverty line will stand at a per capita expenditure of around Rs. 50 per day in rural areas and Rs. 62 in urban areas While the Opposition pillories the Planning Commission for using a formal definition of poverty that ensures the percentage of people below the poverty line is lower than what it ought to be, the government has begun moving to a broader and more realistic de facto...

-The Business Standard Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen, who has just written An Uncertain Glory: India and its Contradictions with Jean Dreze, tells Mihir S Sharma that he doesn't understand why his book has received an angry reaction, or why he is being called anti-growth and pro-redistribution. * Is it startling to discover that you are being called a licence Raj socialist? It is very strange indeed. Perhaps some of this reaction is...

-The Business Standard 7 things you should know in the Bhagwati vs Sen slugfest Jagdish Bhagwati and Amartya Sen are the two Indian economists who are most respected for their work. Both have worked on a broad spectrum of issues, though Sen is best known for his work on public choice and development and Bhagwati for his work on trade. They are both liberal, neoclassical economists, who support deregulation and disapprove of...

-Live Mint We need to further strengthen and resource the mid-day meal scheme, and not consider its curtailment or dilution The bone-chilling tragedy of 22 children dying in Chhapra in rural Bihar after having their mid-day meal at a government school has rightly shaken the public conscience. But we should resist the temptation of simplistic knee-jerk conclusions, or from attributing blame to the local officials alone or to the state administration....

-Economic and Political Weekly The Chhapra tragedy must ask us how we can improve public services, not scrap them altogether. In the aftermath of the ghastly tragedy in Chhapra, Bihar, where 22 children lost their lives after they consumed a government-provided school meal containing organophosphate pesticides, we must demand of the State a far greater commitment to administering large-scale welfare programmes that are meant to improve, not destroy the life of citizens....