-The Business Standard The conflict between a universal and a targeted approach to social welfare which has held back the proposed food security law is now emerging in the ongoing movement for a universal pension. While economist Jean Dreze, who has been demanding universal old age pensions as part of a platform called Pension Parishad, has called for abolition of the Below Poverty Line (BPL) targeting system in all pension schemes, calling...

The Government of India has formally launched the news Guidelines of the MGNAREGA based on the Mihir Shah Committee report. The news guidelines include many new works under conservation activities and it strengthens the hands of the village panchayats and gram sabhas. However, the list of works does not include the activities under the system of rice intensification (SRI) which encourages scientific method of paddy cultivation with better yield in...

The government has taken exception to the `biases' in the United NationsDevelopment Programme's (UNDP) Asia Pacific Human Development report, titled, One Planet, which was released on Thursday. UNDP, required to play a neutral role in international governance, has recommended that India and other countries in the Asia Pacific region take greater responsibility to reduce emissions and warned that 'inclusive growth' would increase emissions, a trade-off that India cannot afford. Pointing...

With the elderly likely to constitute a quarter of India's population by 2050, there is need for a publicly-funded, universal scheme that will overcome destitution among the aged India's social security system is woefully inadequate, when compared even to those in third world economies with no higher per capita incomes. Some States in India have fairly comprehensive social security schemes — notably Kerala, also West Bengal and Tamil Nadu — but...

-The Hindu The Centre on Tuesday unveiled the expanded version of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, allowing over 30 new permissible works, as productivity-enhancing activity. The gram panchayats alone have been empowered to decide on the priority of work to be taken up. Union Minister for Rural Development Jairam Ramesh, who tabled in Parliament a copy of the new notification, and Planning Commission member Mihir Shah told reporters that...