-The Hindu Cabinet clears ₹2.17 lakh cr. in additional Central and State funding to achieve target Having achieved only 55% of its target, the Centre has extended its deadline to provide pucca houses to all families in rural India by two years, to 2024. In a decision taken by the Cabinet on Wednesday, the flagship rural housing scheme, Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana-Gramin, will be provided ₹2.17 lakh crore in additional Central and State...

-The Hindu Nutrition indicators recorded in real-time are not in the public domain The Ministry of Women and Child Development has spent over ₹1,000 crore on its Poshan or Nutrition Tracker, which records real-time data on malnourished and ‘severe acute malnourished’ children in each anganwadi. But four years since its launch, the Government is yet to make the data public. The Government has spent ₹1,053 crore on the Poshan Tracker or Information Communication...

-PTI/ The Hindu The observation was made by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Communications and Information Technology, headed by Congress MP Shashi Tharoor A parliamentary panel on Wednesday asked the information and broadcasting Ministry to properly define the term “anti-national attitude” used in the Cable Network Rules, 2014, saying it may be the cause of unnecessary harassment of private channels. In its 27th report on 'Ethical Standards in Media Coverage', the Parliamentary Standing...

-The Hindu The report suggests in-depth study of the economic fallout of frequent shutdowns There were no verifiable, centralised records of Internet shutdowns in the country. Neither the Ministry of Home Affairs nor the Department of Telecom maintains such a record, the parliamentary standing committee on information and technology pointed out in its report adopted on Tuesday. The committee, headed by senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, pressed for a detailed study on the...

-Down to Earth Farmers yet to be paid Rs 5,724 crore for claims made in 5 years since scheme launch The Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (crop insurance scheme) may have benefitted some farmers but insurance companies surely made the most of it. In the five years since the scheme was launched, these companies received Rs 1,26,521 crore in premium payments and paid Rs 87,320 crore to farmers in loss claims — a...