Two ministries concerned with rural development are at loggerheads over running of the government's flagship scheme- the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA). The agriculture ministry is protesting the way the Rs 40, 000 crore programme is being executed, saying it has increased the burden on agriculture, which is showing just about two percent growth now.   "State-level studies by the Agro Economic Research Centres on wage rate, food security...

Eminent neurologist says kids should not be robbed of their right to grow in a natural way by “restricting [their] learning competence” with education in a foreign language like English An award-winning Jaipur-based neurologist has advocated imparting primary education to children in their mother-tongue, saying it would produce youngsters possessing “fundamentally strong personalities” bestowed with wisdom, motivation, better communication skills and creativity. In his new study, Dr. Ashok Panagariya – honoured with...

Just ahead of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to Moscow, Russia lashed out at protests against the Kudankulam nuclear power project saying that the disruptions may have been stage managed by its rivals. Russia's ambassador to India Alexander M Kadakin said Russian authorities had "great suspicion" about the events at Kudankulum, where the final stage before commissioning of two power plants built with Russian cooperation has been on hold due to...

-The Times of India   Apart from Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Goa was the only other state or union territory not to provide information to the Union government on the status of implementation of the facilities required under the Right to Education Act in March this year. The Union human resource development ministry sought information from all 35 states and union territories in March on the measures implemented and facilities put in place...

-The United Nations    Ensuring global food security while striving to save the Planet from damage are the greatest challenges of this century, a senior United Nations official said today, stressing the need to enable smallholder farmers to become more resilient to climate change and to produce more food in ways that are environmentally sustainable. “There is no trade-off between feeding people and saving our Planet,” said Kanayo F. Nwanze, the President of...