cThe Centre has revised the minimum daily wage under its flagship programme of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) for all the states, Haryana government today said. As per this decision, the MGNREGA workers in Haryana would now get daily wage at the rate of Rs 179 with effect from January 1, 2011, a statement quoting Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda said here. The revised wage rate of...

The face of agriculture in India is changing fast. It needs to become not only sustainable but also profitable for farmers especially the young to stay on the land and cultivate it. The farmers must understand how markets respond to agricultural produce. He should not stop by spending all his life's energy and resources on creating the agricultural produce, but should know how to get good returns for his efforts. This is...

Sikkim has become the only state to bag the national award in all three categories for exemplary work done under MG-NREGA during the recent Mahatma Gandhi NREGA Sammelan in New Delhi. The sammelan was held to commemorate the completion of the fifth year of the commencement of this programme and to give away awards to the best performing gram panchayats, district MGNREGA teams and NGOs by the Union Rural Development ministry. North...

Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act is showing better success of creating assets — ponds or roads — in the two Left ruled states. BJP-ruled states  Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh are laggards, but some Congress states such as Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan, too, are at the bottom. “Real successes of MGNREGA is when land resources are regenerated letting lakhs of marginal farmers go back to agriculture — bringing down the need...

THE Union government is reviewing its landmark initiative, the Forest Rights Act, four years after enacting it. The aim is to find how to strengthen the law which was legislated to ensure the traditional rights of 100 million forest dwelling people in the country. Two high-level groups submitted their assessment in the first week of January. But it seems the Union ministry of environment and forests has made up its mind...