-The Indian Express A tussle is on between El Niño and the Indian Ocean Dipole. Government cannot afford to be a bystander. The Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) has predicted that India will get deficient rains in 2015, likely to be 88 per cent of the long period average (LPA) of 89 cm, which is the average seasonal rain (June-September) received by the country in the 50 years between 1951 and 2000....
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Begin With Gram Sabha -TR Raghunandan
-The Indian Express It can be strengthened —by the collection of taxes at the local level, for instance. Democratic decentralisation, conceived two decades ago, seems to be a lost cause at first sight. Beyond lip service by politicians, neither panchayats nor municipalities have captured the public imagination as viable, responsive, accountable institutions of government. Just after the Karnataka panchayat elections, which ended on June 2, the continued disempowerment of local governments is...
More »No ID means no UID
It is difficult for a person to get aadhaar card/number if s/he does not have pre-existing proofs of identity and address. It has been revealed from a reply to RTI application that only 2.19 lakh aadhaar numbers have been issued to people who did not have any other prior identity proof, which is just 0.03% of total aadhaar numbers generated so far. The RTI reply dated 28 April, 2015 by the Unique...
More »Woes of the farmer -Jaydev Jana
-The Statesman Agriculture is the source of livelihood for nearly 700 million people in India, representing a huge workforce. More than half the GDP of the rural economy is based on agriculture. It is not just a profession but a traditional occupation, a way of life. Agriculture is characterised by small and fragmented land holdings. Small (up to one hectare of land) and marginal (more than one ha and up to 2...
More »Inefficient PDS, tardy laws behind India's hunger capital tag
-Hindustan Times India has earned the discomfiting distinction of being home to the highest number of hungry people among 129 countries monitored by the Food and Agriculture Organization. This was revealed in the State of Food Insecurity in the World 2015 report. Though India has improved its own record here by reducing the figure from 210 million in 1990-92 to 194 million now, it has fallen behind China in this regard....
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