Less than half the funds allocated to the rural development ministry in the current fiscal year for programmes, including the rural job guarantee plan, have been utilized. This is slower than last year, but the government contends tighter monitoring has prevented misuse of funds. The ministry has released Rs.30,846 crore to states in the first six months of the year, or 42% of the Rs.74,100 crore that has been allocated to...

Absence of preventive measures and affordable and accessible health care leads to nearly 500 encephalitis deaths in Uttar Pradesh. IT is a strange paradox. In a country that aspires to be a superpower and boasts of rapid economic growth, 488 children died in a State, Uttar Pradesh, from encephalitis alone this year. It is nothing less than a national shame and tragedy. In six districts of Bihar, close to 200 children...

Comptroller and Auditor General Vinod Rai in his address to recruits at the National Police Academy sought to enlist them in his campaign. BAGEHOT'S classic explains why and how a genre of civil servants mushroomed in India latterly as executive power, authority and prestige declined. None of them had earlier revealed a particularly strong spine. T.N. Seshan bared his traits once he was appointed Chief Election Commissioner (CEC). Others need not...

Rs. 72 crore fund meant to stop chronic malnutrition and hunger deaths among the state’s 90,000 Sahariya tribals unspent or used for welfare of officials Baran, Rajasthan: The consequences of careless, uncaring governance in Jaipur and Delhi-both ruled by the Congress-are proving deadly to India’s poorest tribals and providing a warning to the dangers inherent in India’s upcoming multi-billion dollar social-security scheme. At a time when the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA)...

Six years of RTI’s existence has empowered the Indian citizen as a  proactive partner in governance like never before since Independence. But the government has not been able to digest it, ever since its implementation. Instead of trying to dilute or scuttle the Act, it’s time the government abides by Section (4) norms of ‘suo motu’ disclosure Apart from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, whose innocence and ‘clean image’ stands exposed thanks...