India lives in its villages, Gandhi said. But increasingly, the people of India are dying on its roads. India overtook China to top the world in road fatalities in 2006 and has continued to pull steadily ahead, despite a heavily agrarian population, fewer people than China and far fewer cars than many Western countries. While road deaths in many other big emerging markets have declined or stabilized in recent years,...

The National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) has had an unintended side effect: a record rise in the consumption of Indian Made Foreign Liquor (IMFL) among poor rural families, all thanks to the unprecedented sums of money that the scheme placed in their hands. And the politico-realtor lobby’s record bids for the two-year liquor licences across AP on Monday appears to be in the hope of reaping a bumper harvest...

Children of a remote north-east village Dibrual Dehingio Gaon are now studying in nearby English medium schools, 40 people of Padamunda village in Orissa are employed in transportation business in nearby town and habitants of flood-prone regions of Bihar are no longer starving during rainy seasons; thanks to construction of rural roads under country’s flagship programme Bharat Nirman. Better connectivity has pushed up agricultural income in rural India by 17.6%...

THE NATIONAL Advisory Council ( NAC) headed by UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi has scored its first victory — a change in the proposed Food Security Bill that raises the monthly allocation of foodgrains to the poor from 25 kg to 35 kg at Rs 3 a kilo. The draft Bill, approved by the empowered group of ministers ( EGoM) recently, had offered 25 kg of foodgrains to those below the poverty...

The revised estimates of national income by the Central Statistical Organisation for 2009-10 present a generally positive picture of the economy. During the year, the economy grew by 7.4 per cent, marginally higher than the 7.2 per cent projected in February's advance estimates. A better-than-expected 8.6 per cent growth during the fourth quarter is the main reason. Industry has been a star performer. The strong performance of the crucial segments...