-The Hindu Business Line Despite a lively debate in recent weeks on whether food prices have now moved to being structurally low, analysts believe that this is only a transient phenomenon and food prices, on a sequential basis, have already begun to rise. Retail inflation may be at an 18-month low but prices, especially of food items, are likely to see a pick-up over the next few months with average inflation expected...
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No shortcuts to income guarantee -Harsh Mander
-The Indian Express Rahul Gandhi’s proposed scheme will do more harm than good if it comes at the cost of existing subsidies for the poor. Congress president Rahul Gandhi signaled the earnestness of his party’s resolve to end poverty and hunger by announcing an untried policy instrument — a Minimum Income Guarantee for the poor. “Millions of our brothers and sisters” could not be allowed to “suffer the scourge of poverty”...
More »How to make Direct Benefit Transfers work for the people -Karthik Muralidharan, Paul Niehaus and Sandip Sukhtankar
-IDRonline.org Replacing India's Public Distribution System with Direct Benefit Transfers will improve efficiency, but shouldn't be implemented at the cost of individual choice. The Public Distribution System (PDS) is India’s flagship food security programme but also suffers from well-known inefficiencies. Even official government estimates suggest that a large share of public spending on the PDS does not reach intended beneficiaries. Thus, the idea of Direct Benefits Transfer (DBT) in lieu of subsidised...
More »Managing the stimulus -Neelkanth Mishra
-The Indian Express The income transfer scheme was the highlight of the budget. But its success will need deft manoeuvring. Like in each of the previous two years, the run-up to the budget this year was rife with fears of significant fiscal slippage if the government caved in to political compulsions. And like in prior years, these fears turned out to be exaggerated. The decline in fiscal deficit ratios has indeed...
More »One Egg per Student Proves 'Too Expensive' for Jharkhand Government -Gaurav Vivek Bhatnagar
-TheWire.in Citing rising prices, the BJP government has reduced the number of eggs supplied in the mid-day meal from three to two in Jharkhand. Eleven states ruled by party do not supply any. New Delhi: In keeping with its party’s overall aversion to eggs, the BJP government in Jharkhand has decided to reduce the number of eggs supplied per week to children under the mid-day meal scheme from three to two. This...
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