The Union government recently indexed the wages of workers under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) to the consumer price index for agricultural labour (CPI-AL). The step, aimed at boosting the purchasing power of workers, came in the midst of a controversy over the government not linking wages under MGNREGS to the minimum wage under the Minimum Wages Act, 1948. The wage hike, ranging from 17-30%, is likely...
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13 more die of biting cold in North India
13 more people died due to the biting cold in Uttar Pradesh on Sunday, taking this season's toll to 81. Lucknow recorded a minimum of 3.4 degrees celsius. Bareilly was at 3.2, Allahabad and Gorakhpur were marginally warmer. The national capital Delhi shivered at 5 degrees as icy winds lashed the city. Schools in both states remain closed for another week. Further north, farmers in Punjab are among the hardest hit...
More »Onion raids, from Delhi to Calcutta
Onion hubs were raided across the country today and officials claimed prices tumbled Rs 5-10 as a result of the income-tax department’s action a day after the Centre urged states to counter hoarding. Calcutta’s Sealdah wholesale mart and Asansol were among the places in Bengal that saw the swoops. Similar action was seen in several towns in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Bihar, Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Gujarat. Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee had written to...
More »Punjab rules not in sync with RTI Act: CIC by Jasneet Bindra
Taking on the Department of Information Technology and Administrative Reforms, under which the state information commission falls, Punjab CIC RI Singh asserted that the rules framed by the Punjab government were in conflict with the RTI Act. “The powers to make the rules have been vested with the government to carry out the provisions of this Act and not to thwart them,” he said. Singh said although a formal direction to...
More »Shutting him up by Praful Bidwai
The Raipur sessions court judgment against civil liberties defender and health activist Binayak Sen has provoked outrage. His two-year long detention had drawn protests from the world over. The only substantial charge against Sen is that he passed on three letters from Narayan Sanyal, an undertrial, suspected -- but not yet proved -- to be a Maoist, to the Maoist leadership. It takes several leaps of imagination, or nasty prejudice, to...
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