The Communist Party of India (Marxist) has said that the ordinance issued by the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress government in West Bengal to reclaim 400 out of 997.11 acres of land at the abandoned small car project site of Tata Motors at Singur was “unconstitutional” as the Assembly was then in session. A special session of Assembly was convened on May 30 to elect the Speaker, and the House was given...
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Wages of tokenism by TK Rajalakshmi
The revised daily wage for NREGS workers is still lower than the minimum wages paid in several States. A CONTROVERSY seems to have surfaced between the Prime Minister's Office and the National Advisory Council (NAC) on the issue of wages under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA). The NAC has been arguing for some time that there should be parity between wages under the National Rural Employment...
More »Maximum Dithering for Minimum Wages!
Even though the Central Government agreed to link the wages paid under MG-NREGA to the Consumer Price Index for Agricultural Labourers (CPIAL), it shied away from paying statutory minimum wages in various states of India. Their logic for this: Lack of clarity on who will bear the extra financial burden—the Centre or the states? A letter from the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to UPA and NAC Chairperson Sonia Gandhi dated 31...
More »India-EU Deal Threatens Mom-and-Pop Retail by Ranjit Devraj
Retail giants pushing the European Union-India free trade deal promise consumers a "new and dynamic retail experience" but ignore the fate of India’s "mom-and-pop" stores and some 40 million people they employ. Four years in the making, the EU-India Bilateral Trade and Investment Agreement made serious headway during Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Brussels Dec. 10 and is due to be signed and sealed early 2011. But the negotiations have...
More »Rally for farmers rights on Friday by Sandeep Dua
Alliance for Sustainable and Holistic Agriculture (ASHA) would reach city during its Kisan swaraj yatra on Friday to draw the attention to continuing agricultural crisis in India and call for a comprehensive new path for Indian agriculture. Baba Balbir Singh Seenchewal and Manmohan Waris would join the rally here. A public meeting would be organized in front of PAU gate number two. Out of 10 lakh farming families, 72,000 were forced to...
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