Quite often it is argued by mainstream economists that a sizeable chunk of the Union Budget every year is wasted because the Government spends that on food and fertiliser subsidies. The burgeoning size of these two subsidies relative to the entire budget as well as the gross domestic product (GDP) is often used to build the argument that economic as well as environmental sustainability of the country is at stake...
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The pandemic has hampered social auditing of MGNREGA
When a massive sum of public money is spent on a programme like Mahatma Gandhi Rural Employment Guarantee Programme (MGNREGA)--a demand-driven programme, there is likelihood of financial misappropriations and mismanagement. Thankfully there are checks and balances in the rural employment guarantee legislation to counter such malpractices. It is worth noting that the total allocation under the Mahatma Gandhi Rural Employment Guarantee Programme (MGNREGA) for 2020-21 was Rs. 1,11,500.00 crore (R.E.), up...
More »Recognising housework: Is paying the only way? -Soumya Kapoor Mehta and Sona Mitra
-Hindustan Times While it is a welcome attempt to provide worth to housework, steps to reduce and redistribute such work are perhaps more important than asking for women’s unpaid work to be monetised, even notionally. They are important to ensure women’s rights and a sense of social justice. In January, the Supreme Court directed an insurance company to pay a higher claim amount by taking into account the unpaid work performed by...
More »Shock treatment will not work in agriculture -Sarthi Acharya and Santosh Mehrotra
-The Hindu Post-1991, changes in industry caused a second de-industrialisation; the results in agriculture are likely to be no different Almost all sections of people including farmers agree that the Agricultural Produce Market Committee (APMC)-mandi policies for agricultural marketing, initiated in the 1960s for a few crops, have outlived their utility and the system needs a new policy in the face of the agricultural sector’s growth slowdown, the crop-composition not widening, and...
More »How two websites have transformed the way India is reading about courts – and understanding the law -Sruthisagar Yamunan
-Scroll.in ‘LiveLaw’ and ‘Bar & Bench’ have revolutionised legal reporting by tweeting about proceedings in real time, bringing them to the screens of general readers. On November 19, Justice DY Chandrachud of the Supreme Court of India made a passing comment while hearing a case. “I will tell you something in a lighter vein,” he said. “Instead of wading through the pleadings before us, I thought I will check LiveLaw or other...
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