-The Business Standard Since the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government decided to put on hold the Aadhaar-based subsidy transfer for domestic liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), questions have been raised about the future of one of Congress' most ambitious initiatives aimed at plugging leakages. Two months after the government move, a pioneering study by economists Karthik Muralidharan, Paul Niehaus and Sandip Sukhtankar showed leakages dropped 12 per cent when smart cards were...

-The Hindu Ryots can use it at all bank ATMs to withdraw cash to buy fertilizer or seed TIRUPATI (Andhra Pradesh): ‘RuPay', the multipurpose smart card envisaged to enable payments from various financial institutions to beneficiaries through an impressive network of ATMs, is all set to benefit the farming community more than ever before, said National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) Chairman Harsh Kumar Bhanwala. Speaking after releasing and distributing the...

-The Hindu     The UPA government's response to questions on Aadhaar's voluntariness continues to be marked by ‘intentional ambiguity.' Compulsion by stealth is used to camouflage the use of Aadhaar as a neo-liberal policy tool "This debate is ... about our specific disagreement on the meaning of that one word," i.e. "the Government now seek to persuade us that ‘voluntary' actually means ‘compulsory'." That was Nick Clegg in the United Kingdom's House of Commons...

-Outlook   In the last six months, the Government has transferred over Rs 2,000 crore in the accounts of 40 million consumers under the Direct Benefit Transfer for LPG (DBTL) scheme in 184 districts. "The scheme thus far has been a stupendous success with more than 40 million cash transfers to the consumer's bank accounts. A total sum of over 2,000 crore has been transferred in these high Aadhaar coverage districts providing direct...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: Many doctors across India have been offered prepaid cash cards as gifts by drug industry representatives over the past three years to try and influence prescriptions for patients, pharmaceuticals sales executives have said. While drug companies have long used largesse as "brand reminders" for doctors, a prepaid cash card leaked by an industry whistleblower appears to be the first evidence to suggest doctors are also being offered cash...