-The Central Chronicle   On an experimental basis, mobile banking services have been introduced in eight districts of the state to disburse wages to labourers in their villages itself under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS). There are plans to expand mobile banking services to remaining 42 districts. Under the plan, wages amounting to more than Rs. 74 crore have been paid to over two lakh 75 thousand labourers...

“Agra ke Taj Mahal se Dilly ke Lal Kila tak Sampark Marg.” According to records, this is one of the projects undertaken under NREGS, for which over Rs 1 crore was spent during the last financial year. But inquiries have revealed that there is no such project on the ground. The matter came up during Minister of State for Rural Development Pradeep Jain Aditya’s recent visit to Varanasi. According to the Management...

-PTI   The government’s flagship rural job guarantee scheme is innovative and has achieved quite high coverage but faces challenges like uneven implementation across states and “some evidence” of leakage of funds, a new World Bank report says. The study ‘Social Protection for a Changing India’ also says ensuring higher degree of awareness among people about the process of applying for work under the scheme and a strong monitoring and evaluation system...

The curiosum of a ‘red regime’ with a knack to get re-elected term after term for over more than three decades within the ambit of a full-fledged multi-party democracy has finally disappeared. The Left Front, led by the Communist Party of India (Marxist), has not merely lost the poll in West Bengal, it has been made mincemeat of. Its vote share has come down from close to 50 per cent...

Government has redefined what constitutes poverty A nationwide survey that will simultaneously map the economic, caste and religious backgrounds of the entire population was approved by the Union Cabinet on Thursday. The survey marks two firsts: firstly, in a break with past practice, the Below Poverty Line (BPL) Census has been widened to include urban areas; earlier, it was restricted to rural India. Secondly, the caste headcount, which will be conducted simultaneously...