-PTI The World Bank will not reduce financial assistance to India for poverty alleviation measures because of the recent official data that showed a decline in the number of poor people in the country. The international funding agency takes a long-term view on its commitments and the poverty data released on Monday will not have any bearing on that commitment, World Bank Country Head, Mr N. Roberto Zagha, told PTI on the...

India’s rural hinterland is catching up with urban areas in the use of electricity as the main source of lighting, in access to banking facilities and tap water for drinking, bridging the old rural-urban divide. The housing, households amenities and assets census for 2011 once again showed that rural India is fast converting into a more urbanised society. “It is part of the process of development that areas left behind eventually...

Parliament must use budget session to discuss key pending bills The budget session of Parliament begins today. The last few sessions have been characterised by disruptions and consequent loss of productive time. To see one indicator, the 15th Lok Sabha, half-way through its term, has lost 30 per cent of scheduled time — the worst ever. As a result, many important bills have been pending. It is to be seen whether...

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh can be devastatingly polite: when Bharatiya Janata Party president Nitin Gadkari, who has a commercial interest in agriculture, wrote him a doomsday letter on the dire state of agriculture under UPA rule, Dr. Singh took a month to reply, but when he did, it was to tell the BJP president in excruciating detail about the rise in agricultural production during his tenure in office, which compares...

In the initial months of governance by the Trinamool Congress in West Bengal, attempts appear to have been made to begin subverting the positive results of the land reform programme of the Left Front. What is happening appears to be the inevitable outcome of political rivalry, the hegemonic rule of one party giving place to another, with the citadel of power changing its colour, making the “red” one “green”. But...