-Reuters   Clad in white home-spun garments and living in a spartan room of his village's Hindu temple, Anna Hazare is an unlikely thorn in the side of the government hundreds of miles away in New Delhi. And yet for millions of Indians, he is a 21st-century Mahatma Gandhi, inspiring a rare wave of protests against the spiralling corruption that has tarnished the up-and-coming image of Asia's third-largest economy. Like Gandhi, who led India's...

Protest against government attempts to suppress democratic resistance by villagers Police avoid confrontation; no work on construction of boundary wall As Orissa on Wednesday made failed attempts to acquire land for the Posco steel plant in Jagatsinghpur district, five political parties announced that they would begin an indefinite dharna opposing the Naveen Patnaik government's attempts to suppress democratic resistance by villagers who oppose establishment of the project in their locality. The dharna would...

-Express News Service   After initial refusal to sanction funds under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) to the six districts under CBI scanner, the Centre on Monday released Rs 170 crore for the wage employment programme. “The Government received the Central assistance and this has been distributed among six districts,” said Panchayati Raj Secretary PK Jena.  Though the Ministry of Rural Development (MoRD) released the first installment of `...

In another case of alleged fraud during implementation of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) in Meghalaya, a father-son duo duped gullible villagers in the name of implementation of the Central scheme. The matter came to light after villagers from Thadan village, 40 km from here, got wind of the scam and filed a Right To Information (RTI) application which showed their names enlisted as workers having job cards. Louis...

  Can we agree in this country on a floor of human dignity below which we will not allow any human being to fall? No child, woman or man in this land will sleep hungry. No person shall be forced to sleep under the open sky. No parent shall send their child out to work instead of to school. And no one shall die because they cannot afford the cost of...