The NREGS is restricted. The PDS is targeted. Only exploitation is universal. The rotting of lakhs of tonnes of foodgrain in open yards, while shocking, is hardly new or surprising. Remember the rural poor marching on godowns in Andhra Pradesh in 2001 in similar circumstances? The Supreme Court was quite right in jolting the Union government. “In a country where admittedly people are starving, it is a crime to waste even...

The employment guarantee scheme has resulted in a big spurt in not only wages but also household income in the rural areas, an analysis of the data since the beginning of the programme in 2006-07 show. While rural wages have risen 38% since 2006-07, household income saw a 74% increase in the four years up to 2009-10. This is despite the fact that just 13% of the 5 crore beneficiary families...

The Supreme Court’s observations on the public distribution system (PDS) which call for exclusion of people living above poverty line (APL); fixing monthly ration on per head rather than per household basis; and using unique identification (UID) cards for targeting PDS supplies have implications that go beyond the PDS. The court has virtually set new parameters even for the proposed food security law since that is also likely to be...

What do three members of the National Advisory Council, two members of the Planning Commission, Editors (including the editor and executive editor of this magazine), MPs from across the political spectrum, CII members and the NCPCR have in common? One single demand: no child under 14 should be engaged in child labour. Forty-five eminent members of society from very diverse backgrounds have thrown their considerable weight behind an ongoing campaign...

The 25 per cent quota in all schools envisaged by the RTE has created a big debate Do upper middle class people in a city believe that the quality of their child's education is compromised when they share classroom space with the children of construction Labourers or domestic workers? This fundamental question is at the heart of the heated debate on a clause in the Right to Free and Compulsory Education Act,...