Retail prices of onions continued to remain high on Tuesday even as a ban on exports led to a 30% fall in wholesale rates. The government, however, cautioned that retail prices would fall from current exorbitant levels (of Rs 75-80 per kg) only after three weeks. But prices are expected to return to the last month's reasonable levels (Rs 20-25 per kg) across the country only in March, when the...
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NHRC moots super-specialty hospital for Endosulfan victims
Terming as “very serious” the diseases suspected to have been caused by the use of Endosulfan in the Plantation Corporation of Kerala's cashew estates in the district, the National Human Rights Commission has recommended setting up a multi super-specialty hospital here to treat the victims. The health situation arising out of the use of Endosulfan on the PCK land is very serious and all agencies, including the government, people's representatives and...
More »Vidarbha farmers demand minister's dismissal
Farmers in Maharashtra's Vidarbha region have urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to sack Vilasrao Deshmukh as Union Heavy Industries Minister, after the Supreme Court ruled he misused his authority to protect a Congress legislator's money-lender father who charge exorbitant interest rates. "Local legislators are getting police protection with the help of top leaders and are exploiting the debt-trapped farmers who are committing suicide," Kishor Tiwari, president of Vidarbha Jan Andolan Samiti,...
More »Who should be CVC? by Bhaskar Ghose
WHAT the Government of India did when it appointed P.J. Thomas Central Vigilance Commissioner (CVC) is inexplicable. For that public office, the government, naturally, ought to have looked for a person whose record did not have even the slightest of ambiguities, and such persons are not difficult to find. There are several civil servants whose integrity is unquestionable. The myth that all bureaucrats are corrupt is not just that, a...
More »How the PDS is changing in Chattisgarh by Udit Misra
The Chhattisgarh model offers some key lessons on how to make the public distribution system deliverProbably the only thing extraordinary about Manglu is that he is the perfect example of an ordinary tribal. The 60-year-old belongs to the Pahadi Korba tribe and lives in Govindpur village of Sarguja district of Chhattisgarh. He best represents what modern India calls a below poverty line (BPL) beneficiary of various government schemes. Manglu earns...
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