-The Hindu Aadhaar-based biometric authentication did not reduce PDS Leakages, finds Jharkhand-based empirical study “Aadhaar has curtailed Leakages of government subsidies... Through Aadhaar, savings worth ₹90,000 crore have accrued to the government,” said Ajay Bhushan Pandey, then CEO of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) and current Revenue Secretary, in UIDAI’s 2017-18 annual report. But not so fast, say Professors Karthik Muralidharan, Paul Niehaus and Sandip Sukthankar. They have just published a...

-Economic and Political Weekly The public distribution system is the cornerstone of anti-poverty initiatives in India to address the issue of hunger and malnutrition, but is plagued with Leakages and corruption. Though several possible reasons account for these problems, one factor that is generally overlooked is the lack of assessment of the preference of the beneficiaries in terms of product portfolio, selection, and delivery mechanisms. Through a mixed methods analysis across...

-Down to Earth Govt has made tall claims on NREGA implementation; but it is neither keen on providing dignified wages nor allocating adequate funds for the scheme The Union Budget for 2019-20 ignored issues of social security and employment and did not show any intent to boost rural India. The Budget tabled by Nirmala Sitharaman on July 5, 2019 was a disappointment for 13 crore rural households dependent on the Mahatma Gandhi...

-TheWire.in With one of the highest undernutrition rates of children in urban areas, Delhi needs to tackle the issue of severely stunted children in the city who don't have access to proper infrastructure and facilities at local anganwadi centres. New Delhi: It is an early summer morning in North Delhi’s Kabir Basti. A dingy and crowded lane of the settlement, with puddles from water Leakages in broken pipes, opens up to a...

-Livemint.com * A new research paints a mixed picture on the relative merits of Aadhaar-based biometric authentication in the PDS * The research highlight there can be several ways to authenticate beneficiaries in the public distribution system Since 2017, the Indian government has mandated the use of Aadhaar-based biometrics in India’s public distribution system (PDS) to tackle the longstanding issue of Leakages. Critics, however, suggest that this has excluded many beneficiaries and increased...