The 3-1 conclusion of the POSCO panel that all clearances to the Rs 50,000-crore project be scrapped should haven’t come as a surprise to at least one person: Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh. The panel’s report now wends its way through the Ministry’s official expert committees. For, Ramesh had handpicked these members and each of the three who opposed the project has, in the past, taken clearly stated positions on infrastructure projects,...
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NAC recommends food security net for 75 p.c. of population
The National Advisory Council (NAC), headed by Sonia Gandhi, on Saturday recommended to the government to grant differential legal entitlement of foodgrains to nearly 800 million people through a reformed PDS network from the next financial year. The NAC also decided to set aside the BPL criteria and suggested two broad categories — priority and general — eligible for legal foodgrain entitlement under the proposed food security law. As per the recommendations,...
More »Poor get less food from Sonia's NAC
The National Advisory Council, headed by Congress President Sonia Gandhi, on Saturday settled for a much less ambitious National Food Security Act than it had previously agreed to. Scaling down its recommendations, it decided to recommend subsidised foodgrains for 46% of the rural Indian population and 28% of the urban population. The pruning of the recommendation had an immediate fallout, with the NAC member Jean Dreaze, face of the right-to-food security campaign,...
More »Jean Drèze's dissent note
After the National Advisory Council (NAC) cleared the food security framework on Saturday, council member and development economist Jean Drèze issued a dissent note saying that “an opportunity [had] been missed to initiate a radical departure in this field.” “The NAC proposals [are] a great victory for the government — they allow it to appear to be doing something radical for food security, but it is actually more of the same,”...
More »NAC consensus on food security by Smita Gupta
75% of population to get 35 kg of foodgrains; 20 kg for rest After months of hard bargaining with the Planning Commission and the government, the Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council (NAC) on Saturday appeared to have got a consensus on a universal food security system with legal guarantees, even though with differential entitlements. However, the NAC has expanded the concept of below the poverty line (BPL)-PDS beneficiaries, virtually doubling their number...
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