-Newsclick.in The additional funds of Rs 6,084 crore released recently will go into clearing the backlog of pending liabilities. Contrary to the claims of highest ever allocation to the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), the social security scheme that aims to guarantee the right to work is facing severe fund crisis – with state governments left with no funds to pay workers. From October 2018 to February 1, no...

-The Telegraph Centre to eat up savings in case of death of subscriber and spouse The Centre will swallow the contribution of unorganised workers under a new pension scheme in the event of the death of the subscriber and his or her spouse, according to an official notification. Contributory pension schemes usually ensure payments to dependant and unmarried children. However, the notification for the Pradhan Mantri Shram Yogi Maan-dhan, announced in the interim Union...

-The Hindu The first transfer of money under the PM-KISAN scheme is scheduled for Sunday. Priscilla Jebaraj reports from villages in Warangal, Telangana on how farmers have benefited from Rythu Bandhu, the income support scheme seen as the inspiration behind PM-KISAN Early one morning in the second week of February this year, A. Kumaraswamy, 30, set out from his home in Devanoor village in Telangana’s Warangal district and walked towards his cotton...

-The Indian Express Rahul Gandhi’s proposed scheme will do more harm than good if it comes at the cost of existing subsidies for the poor. Congress president Rahul Gandhi signaled the earnestness of his party’s resolve to end poverty and hunger by announcing an untried policy instrument — a Minimum Income Guarantee for the poor. “Millions of our brothers and sisters” could not be allowed to “suffer the scourge of poverty”...

  The budgetary allocation for Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) as a proportion of total budgetary expenditure has been reduced marginally during the Interim Budget 2019-20. It may have happened because the coverage of gross cropped area under the scheme could not keep pace with the target that was set during the last two years. The Status of Implementation of Budget Announcements 2017-18, which was presented during the Union Budget 2018-19,...