-The New Indian Epxress NEW DELHI: Any delay in paying the wages under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) is "simply not acceptable" and red-tape cannot be "pedalled" as an excuse to deny payment to the workers, the Supreme Court said today. The court, while noting that the Centre has admitted delay in payment of wages, said the payments to the workers must be transferred to them immediately, failing...

-The Economic Times The art of good governance is through trial and error, figuring out what works where and how, and scaling up from below. Only then can one have a solid foundation. Aadhaar literally means something that holds (dhaaran: to hold). The word is interpreted either as a foundation or base (such as, to a building), or a container (such as, of water), even though given that it is an identity-verifying...

-Scroll.in Halfway through the ambitious Bhavantar Bhugtan Yojana, farmers are protesting and accusing traders of suppressing prices. When the Madhya Pradesh government introduced the Bhuvantar Bhugtan Yojana in August it hoped the new scheme would assuage angry farmers and provide them a cushion against a possible price crash of farm produce. But in the first harvest season after the scheme was introduced farmers continue to get prices below their expectations. Many farmers...

-The Economic Times Aadhaar came with a lot of promises. They were brought by some of the brightest in India. Aadhaar promises to remove duplicates and ghosts from government databases, deliver subsidies to beneficiaries, collect taxes, provide financial inclusion and eliminate corruption. Here is why it cannot deliver anything it promises. Aadhaar came with a lot of promises. They were brought by some of the brightest in India. Promise 1: Removing Fraud and Duplicates In...

-The Hindu There is no case for water privatisation. In pushing for it, we are ignoring the key issue, which is better governance, writes Himanshu Thakkar Privatisation of water is unwarranted, unjustified and unnecessary. In pushing for it, we are not really addressing the key issue plaguing the water sector, which is a need for better governance. We need a democratic, transparent, accountable and participatory governance in a bottom-up approach, on each...