-The Times of India BHOPAL: At a time when suicides by farmers in Madhya Pradesh following scanty rain and poor yield have brought back focus on their plight, allegedly more than 1.77 lakh ghost farmers benefitted from interest subsidies on their loans. Putting a question mark on the much hyped 0% interest farm loan scheme of the state government, a series of RTI queries by TOI revealed that between 2007-08 and 2012-13,...

-Livemint.com Move to train 10,000 youths aimed at maintaining quality of assets created under rural jobs scheme New Delhi: The ministry of rural development is planning to train at least 10,000 youths in basic civil engineering concepts and engage them in the planning and supervision of works carried out under the ministry’s flagship welfare programme—the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), according to ministry officials who did not want...

-The Hindu The production of waste in India is growing at an exponential rate. However, the welfare and dignity of the informal workers involved in the stigmatised sector of waste management remains at the bottom of any government’s political agenda. Human society has always produced waste and always will. Waste materials — substances without value — are constantly generated in all production, all distribution and all consumption processes. The time waste spends...

-Business Standard Sixteen states and Union territories implemented the Act's provisions in all districts or some The Centre has decided not to extend the Wednesday deadline for states to implement the National Food Security Act (NFSA). "Those states who have not adopted the NFSA will continue to get grains under old public distribution system rates, but they must realise it is not in their own interest to keep away from the Act for...

-The Hindu A recent proposal to curtail the powers of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India runs contrary to national and international conventions. Rather, it is the duty of both the executive and the legislature to strengthen this constitutional office A conference of the chairpersons of Public Accounts Committees (PACs) has just been held under the aegis of the Parliament’s PAC. Nishikant Dubey, Member of Parliament (Lok Sabha), member PAC, and...