The Planning Commission’s advice to the Haryana government to levy a cess on agricultural power to raise funds for replenishing dwindling groundwater is wise counsel that is likely to fall on deaf ears. There is no denying that the continuous decline in groundwater levels across the subcontinent and weak attempts at replenishment constitute a grave threat to human security in this part of the world. Haryana is not a lonely...

Development models that focus attention on the poor while expanding job opportunities, increased government spending on social services and aid flows from affluent nations are all successful strategies for alleviating global poverty, the United Nations says. Access to low carbon energy and mobilizing domestic capital by, for example, improving tax collection, are the other factors the UN Development Programme (UNDP) identifies in a new report as crucial factors for the...

The latest report on the progress of millennium development goals (MDG) by the United Nations has said that robust social protection and employment schemes such as India's Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MNREGS) reduce poverty and reverse inequality. In its report, ‘What Will it Take to Achieve Millennium Development Goals,' the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has said the MNREGS is known for improving livelihoods through legal guarantee of...

The Supreme Court on May 7 ruled that natural resources were national assets that belonged to the people and were ideally exploited by public sector undertakings. This obviously implies that local communities, including tribals, living on mineralised land, enjoy entitlements but not prescriptive ownership rights to such national assets. This is an important reiterative clarification defining mineral rights in Fifth Schedule areas that are currently in contention. Whether PSUs should...

Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today said the decision on free power to the farm sector will be discussed in the cabinet but rejected the Planning Commission's contention that it was responsible for the alarming depletion of groundwater in the state. "The farmers of Punjab have been using ground water for the crops and the state has helped whole country to overcome food crises many times," Badal said, reacting to...