The current perception that cash transfers can replace public provision of basic goods and services and become a catch-all solution for poverty reduction is false. Where cash transfers have helped to reduce poverty, they have added to public provision, not replaced it. For crucial items like food, direct provision protects poor consumers from rising prices and is part of a broader strategy to ensure domestic supply. Problems like targeting errors...

Conditional cash transfers” (CCTs) are a new buzzword in policy circles. The idea is simple: give poor people cash conditional on good behaviour such as sending children to school. This helps to score two goals in one shot: poor people get some income support, and at the same time, they take steps to lift themselves out of poverty. CCT enthusiasm, however, is often based on a superficial reading of the Latin...

“Agra ke Taj Mahal se Dilly ke Lal Kila tak Sampark Marg.” According to records, this is one of the projects undertaken under NREGS, for which over Rs 1 crore was spent during the last financial year. But inquiries have revealed that there is no such project on the ground. The matter came up during Minister of State for Rural Development Pradeep Jain Aditya’s recent visit to Varanasi. According to the Management...

-Express News Service   The benefits under the Rashtriya Suraksha Bima Yojana (RSBY) have failed to trickle down to the beneficiaries the Below Poverty Line (BPL) families. Though launched as a pilot project in Kalahandi in November 2009, poor management and lack of awareness among the BPL beneficiaries have marred the cashless treatment provision. Out of the surveyed 2,24,859 BPL families, 1,03,083 families were enrolled in 20092010. Ironically, in the first year, only 1,513...

Mass leaders in India have a tradition of broaching BSP —bijli, sadak and pani — issues to strike a chord during election rallies. However, in almost each of her 150-plus rallies across the state in the election season, Mamata Banerjee deviated from the conventional mix and squeezed into her speech phrases like debt burden, public finance and economic recovery. Whether such esoteric terms found resonance or not, Mamata did get across the...