Indigenous knowledge and farming practices of the region's tribal people recognised for promoting food security and conserving biodiversity Traditional farming systems in India have received a major boost at a time when Indian agriculture is struggling to come to terms with modern technologies. The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations has accorded the status of Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System (GIAHS) to the traditional agricultural system being practiced...
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Aruna Roy, RTI activist interviewed by Pallavi Polanki
The lone Indian activist on the 2011 TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world, Aruna Roy has been more successful than most, when it comes to getting the government’s attention. The Chennai-born former bureaucrat who was an instrumental force behind the revolutionary Right to Information Act has also been credited by the government for “incorporating strong citizen entitlements” in the ambitious National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). A constant...
More »Focused solutions required to clear pending cases by Bibek Debroy
-The Economic Times All of us are bothered, or should be, about interminable delays in adjudication through formal legal systems. Gypsies are believed to have originated in India and there is a gypsy curse - may you have a lawsuit in which you are in the right. In 2010, there were 54,600 cases stuck in Supreme Court, 4.18 million in high courts and 27.89 million in lower (district and subordinate) courts. Pedantic...
More »States spend crores, fail to show work by Prasad Nichenametla
Despite the Rs 5,631 crore — to be the highest in the country, which the Mayawati government in Uttar Pradesh had spent under the MG-NREGA in 2010-11, but it failed to show any good work carried by it. Its not just Uttar Pradesh, but half of the states did not find any work worth to be nominated for a national award for best performing panchayats in implementation of NREGA in 2010-11. There...
More »Understanding the PDS by Jean Dreze and Reetika Khera
A survey in nine States shows that they have quietly revived and expanded their public distribution system. AT a time when the Union Cabinet cleared the draft of the national food security Bill after dilly-dallying over it comes a compelling piece of information: many State governments have quietly revived and expanded the public distribution system in their States. That, at any rate, is one of the main findings of a...
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