The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, which has revitalised the rural landscape across the country, stands diminished in the land of its birth, Rajasthan, hijacked and held to ransom by vested interests and stripped of its backbone of an open social audit. As the Andhra experience has shown, there is one ingredient that can bring back its vitality: institutionalising citizen audits. But, is the Rajasthan government up to...

The stance of the ministry of rural development stands null and void. At least, as far as officials of the state government are concerned. For most of them that the delegation of the Mazdoor Satyagrah met on Monday agreed in unison that it is unconstitutional to pay MGNREGA workers anything less that the minimum wages. However, officials expressed their inability to pay more and demanded the total component from the Centre. Recently,...

Evincing keen interest in working with India in the area of rural development, a British delegation today called on Rural Development Minister C P Joshi and sought co-operation in furthering Indo-British ties in the sector.The delegation, led by All Party Indo-British Parliamentary Group chairman and Labour Member of Parliament for Ealing Southall Virendra Sharma sought the co-operation of the Ministry in furthering Indo-British ties in poverty alleviation, education, skill development...

As the common man continues to reel under the spiraling rise in prices of essential commodities especially key food items and vegetables the forever-rising food inflation is posing a serious challenge to policy makers. Though top government officials, including the Finance Minister and the Chairman of the Planning Commission have repeatedly assured that the food prices will soon stop rising, in reality it has gone the other way.   The rising spree...

With the state government agreeing to increase the minimum wages by 35% with effect from January 1, the focus of the on-going Mazdoor Haq Yatra has now shifted to demands that even NREGA be given the minimum wages from the current freeze at Rs 100. The Yatra originated about a fortnight ago in the state demanding a rise in minimum wages and better implementation of NREGA. The Yatra is supported by...