Although MGNREGA has been looked upon with suspicion by the Government, industry as well as the landed farming class for various reasons including inefficiency, leakages, corruption, rise in rural wages, cost escalation etc., a new report reveals that the programme reduced poverty among its participants between 2004-05 and 2011-12 by providing employment. The report entitled Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act: A Catalyst for Rural Transformation has estimated that...

-The Indian Express   It has only managed to kill manufacturing and employment growth    In the 1950s, misapplied economic policies gave India one of the lowest growth rates in the world for 30 years, and left it behind East and Southeast Asia. Now another set of policies is completing its economic ruin. The architect of this is the RBI and its instrument of choice, the interest rate. Indian business has been begging for a...

-The Hindu Business Line The Prime Minister will launch the India Handloom brand today, the country’s first National Handloom Day India’s handloom fabrics are an integral part of the rich culture and heritage of India, and are appreciated world over for their colour, texture and design. During our freedom struggle, Mahatma Gandhi had stressed the need for hand spinning, handloom weaving and wearing India-made fabrics; thus khadi became an integral part of...

-The Times of India As crops fail, banks don't deliver and the government falters, Mandya's farmers find themselves at the mercy of unscrupulous moneylenders Chenne Gowda has a Rs. 4 lakh albatross around his neck. The 55-year-old sugarcane farmer from Chikka maralli village in Pan davapura taluk, Mandya district, took the loan from private moneylenders but has no idea how he'll repay. His crop, on two acres, is wilting in the field...

-Hindustan Times For a country that is set to be ranked among the world’s top five economies over the next decade, India cannot afford to be counted as a home for impoverished farmers who are ending their lives because they do not have the money to return loans as small as Rs 10,000. According to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data, 5,650 farmers committed suicide in India last year. Bankruptcy and...