-Business Standard To be announced in next few weeks and in coming Budget To widen its rural push and to counter the Opposition's allegation that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government is anti-poor, the Centre is mulling multiple interventions which would include expanding the role of women-driven self help groups (SHGs) and promoting self-employment for rural youth. Some official said the new crop insurance scheme, approved by the Cabinet recently is part of...

-GovernanceNow.com Hamlets in four states show how community efforts can combat malnutrition among children. Funds for the initiative, however, are drying up As the trees and bushes give way to Bada Doomartoli, a hamlet of Singhpur village in Nagri block of Ranchi, one can see a bunch of children running around playfully in the verandah of the first house. Their screeching can be heard from a distance. The younger children sit...

-The Hindu Business Line Land should not be viewed as the only factor of productivity. And, managing food prices calls for better market intelligence The Centre’s emphasis on manufacturing, manifested in initiatives such as ‘Make in India’ and ‘Skill India’ have a downside: relative indifference to agriculture. Some of this is already visible in terms of rural distress and food price inflation. This can prove costly to the economy, reminiscent of the...

-The Hindu Employees from the community say they have poor representation in officer ranks The Supreme Court on Friday asked the Centre and public sector banking authorities to consider providing reservation to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes employees in promotion to officers’ ranks at all levels. “The grievance of the employees belonging to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes category is that there is negligible representation of employees belonging to their community in...

-The Hindu Business Line The mythology of free trade being a force for economic progress remains entrenched in world politics Globalisation has created a unique spectator sport, where political dignitaries periodically gather at carefully chosen venues for days of deliberation over humanity’s most consequential problems. It is a spectacle at which ‘civil society’ — as the new force in world politics is called — is granted a tent of its own, financed...