-The Telegraph Around 30 economists, including former NAC member Jean Dreze, today urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to do away with categorisation of beneficiaries under the proposed national food security bill. Dreze, who was part of the Sonia Gandhi-headed council, and the others have written to Singh saying the bill has “serious shortcomings” that needed to be removed. The bill, pending in Parliament, provides for subsidised grain for up to 75 per cent...
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Overnight prosperity clue to industry cash flow to Maoists by Jaideep Hardikar
A bidi-smoking petty contractor who suddenly bought two Boleros and a former newspaper hawker who zipped about Chhattisgarh’s jungles in a Toyota may hold the key to a question bugging the custodians of National Security. What the police want to know is: are business houses paying off the Maoists to be able to operate deep inside central India’s mineral-rich guerrilla zones? Chhattisgarh police say that when contractor B.K. Lala’s bank account suddenly...
More »PM sets record straight; here's food for thought, Mr. Gadkari by Smita Gupta
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh can be devastatingly polite: when Bharatiya Janata Party president Nitin Gadkari, who has a commercial interest in agriculture, wrote him a doomsday letter on the dire state of agriculture under UPA rule, Dr. Singh took a month to reply, but when he did, it was to tell the BJP president in excruciating detail about the rise in agricultural production during his tenure in office, which compares...
More »Food policies not working: Gujarat study by Chitra Unnithan
Various government policies such as the Public Distribution System (PDS), mid-day meal, food for work programme, National Rural Employment Guaranty Scheme (NREGA) have failed to create food security at the household level, says a study by Gujarat Institute of Development Research. The findings of a primary survey of 110 households undertaken in two districts of two villages - a tribal district and a developed one - in Gujarat showed that about...
More »A scam in pulses import? CAG estimates Rs 1,200 crore loss on import of subsidised pulses by Tejinder Narang
In December 2011, CAG tabled a well-analysed audit report in Parliament claiming a loss of 1,200 crore, or $250 million, on the import of subsidised pulses through 2006-11 under the supervision of department of consumer affairs (DCA) of the food ministry. The government's intention to introduce such a scheme cannot be faulted: during 2005-08, seven million tonnes of wheat was imported at high prices, chana (chickpeas) values spiked from 21...
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