Rural development minister Jairam Ramesh today questioned the policy of providing free electricity to farmers in certain states, saying excessive pumping by cultivators had led to a depletion in groundwater levels. “In district after district, groundwater tables are falling. And there is no doubt that free electricity has caused excessive use of water. Our policies on pricing of water also do not lead to conservation. So we have to rethink on...

The finance ministry is putting shape to a new social security scheme for unorganized sector workers, creating for the first time a safety net for millions of underpaid and overworked people, many of whom living in abject poverty.  The ministry has discussed with the Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) and the four state run non-life insurance companies the contours of this scheme that will provide life insurance, health cover and retirement pension...

-The Economic Times   The UPA government - especially the Planning Commission - has been taken to task for fixing a poverty line at a level (Rs 32 per capita/day in urban areas) that does not even guarantee a bare subsistence. In the medley of scathing critiques and rebuttals, three strands of arguments seem dominant. One is that the poverty line is utterly unrealistic as a measure of subsistence requirements of food, health...

The spurt in farm credit by commercial banks, including regional rural banks, has interestingly not led to any let-up in distress in the agrarian economy -- a mystery that continues to baffle academics, policy planners and, more recently, bankers Last week, a clutch of bankers and policy wonks gathered in Bangalore to review recent trends in farm credit. On the face of it, credit to the farm sector is on an...

While Rahul Gandhi spoke of a woman delivering a baby once a week and 52 times a year in Uttar Pradesh according to the official record of the Janani Suraksha Yojana (JSY) on Monday, Youth Congress men in Lucknow were busy preparing an exhibition of glaring cases of corruption in the scheme at their state office.   The exhibition, based on an audit conducted in 12 blocks, is expected to start on...