-Kafila.org This release was put out yesterday by the RIGHT TO FOOD CAMPAIGN On the second day of the “Right to Food dharna” convened by the Right to Food Campaign, hundreds of poor women from across the country braved the morning cold and rain to assemble at Jantar Mantar and voice their concerns,  including the demand for a universal PDS, universalization with quality of ICDS, universal maternity entitlements, universal pensions for single...

Tata Motors welcomes verdict; Mamata says people’s choice will prevail In a setback to the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress government in West Bengal, a division bench of the Calcutta High Court struck down the “Singur Land Rehabilitation and Development Act of 2011”, terming it unconstitutional and void. The law was enacted in 2011 to vest farm land acquired by the previous government for Tata Motors’ Nano small car factory in Singur...

Aamra ekhon-o boli ni kon kagoj porte hobe, kintu agami dine kintu setao bole debo. (Till now, we haven’t told which newspapers must be read, but in the future, we will do that as well.) – West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, speaking on March 29 in defense of her government’s decision to bar all but 13 newspapers from more than 2,400 government-approved libraries across the state. “Kunal Ghosh, associate editor...

Central allocation for the Mahatama Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MNREGS) has been falling in recent years, with this year recording the steepest decline. Money released for the scheme fell from Rs 35,242 crore last year to Rs 21,441 crore this year, while expenditure has gone down from Rs 39,000 crore last year to Rs 20,000 crore as of January-end. The average workdays under the scheme, which provides a legal entitlement...

-IANS There were only 12 days of work per household in West Bengal under the rural jobs scheme MGNREGA as against the national average of 28 days, say NGOs who blame organisational inefficiency and faulty implementation for the situation in the state. The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) assures 100 days of work for one member of every rural household in a year. But West Bengal's performance has...