A few years ago, Paul Kagame, president of Rwanda, had a chance meeting with Som Pal, former member of the Planning Commission and earlier minister of state for agriculture, and was bowled over by his sage-like views on developmental issues. The president promptly invited Som Pal to his blighted country to suggest policy measures to get out of a developmental quagmire. Som Pal travelled to Rwanda; he was hosted at...

“Efforts of Empowered Committee set up to monitor the works ineffective” The third report of the Shunglu Committee on “City Infrastructure,” which has been submitted to the Prime Minister and “is being examined,” has severely indicted the Delhi government for its handling of the works and also noted that the efforts of the Empowered Committee, constituted to overlook them, were also “by and large ineffective.” It said while Rs.254 crore in ‘undue...

Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia on Saturday said the Vidarbha region has failed to keep pace with development in the rest of the country. Speaking to TOI, he said, "I won't use the word backward because we do not believe in that concept. But, yes, Vidarbha is clearly lagging behind the rest of Maharashtra." He was in Nagpur to speak on 'Growing disparity despite growing GDP'. "He urged the people...

As of 2006, over 43% of Indian children under five were malnourished, a rate that has barely budged since the early 1990s. This gives India the dubious distinction of having the highest percentage of malnourished children in the world. There are at least 53 poorer countries with lower malnutrition rates, including Bangladesh, Nepal, Haiti and several African countries. At Independence, India was poor, so it wasn’t thought possible to guarantee...

The National Advisory Council today won a victory over the government with Sonia Gandhi stressing the inclusion of eight “highly vulnerable” groups among the priority beneficiaries of the food security bill. Sources said the rural development ministry, headed by Vilasrao Deshmukh, had been resisting the panel’s recommendation for a new category of households that are “highly vulnerable to food insecurity”. The eight groups identified by Sonia are: “Particularly vulnerable” tribal groups; Mahadalits; Households headed by...