More than two years have passed and there seems to be no progress worth speaking about in making the promised law that will guarantee food for the people. The promise came from the UPA-2 as part of its election manifesto in 2009. It was a time of recovery from a time of economic troubles. The impact of the global economic slowdown came on top of the agrarian crisis and the...
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Online RTI courts on the anvil by Ajit Nayak
SAMBALPUR: In an attempt towards speedy disposal of RTI Act cases, the state RTI commission has decided to hold online courts. The commission hopes such courts will not only help it to listen to grievances from people located at distant places but will also help the commission to save time by doing away with the practice of moving from place to place to hold camp courts. "It is hoped the implementation...
More »Draft State labour policy released
-The Hindu Minimum wages to unorganised workers The draft labour policy, released by Labour Minister Shibu Baby John here on Tuesday, proposes measures to ensure minimum wages to workers in the unorganised sector and check unhealthy tendencies such as ‘nokkukooli' in the loading and unloading sector. Releasing the policy, the Minister said that no time frame had been fixed for achieving these objectives because attitudes needed to be changed. All trade unions had...
More »An uneven field by Pranab Bardhan
The rural development ministry has put out a draft of the proposed National Land Acquisition and Rehabilitation and Resettlement (LARR) bill for public comment. There is no doubt it is a big improvement on the 1894 colonial law that was long overdue for repeal; in particular, it is intended to be far more farmer-friendly. Yet, in several respects the Bill is patently inadequate, both in its objectives and the mechanics...
More »Nandan Nilekani's UIDAI and Census' NPR in role overlap for fingerprinting and other biometric data by Vikas Dhoot
Two ambitious government projects are competing for your fingerprints. While the National Population Register (NPR) of the Census office has been tasked with the mandate of providing biometric-based identity cards to all Indian residents, Nandan Nilekani's Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has sought more funds to expand the UID enrollment exercise to virtually cover the entire population over the age of five years. According to the original, but little-known proposal,...
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