-The Hindu Business Line SHGs pave the road to financial independence in UP villages Three years ago, Simrikha Devi’s eightyear-old son made an unusual request. He asked for hundred rupees to buy biscuits,knowing well that his mother, a daily wager, would have to scrounge for the money. Although she was taken aback, Simrikha gave him the money. Her curiosity grew further when he returned with a bag of biscuit packets and began hawking...

-The Hindu Centre for Politics and Public Policy Prime Minister Narendra Modi's announcement demonetising high denomination notes on November 8, 2016, will do little to address the prime objective of flushing out black money but will adversely affect the economy in the short term, especially the informal sector, which is predominant in India, says M. Govinda Rao, a Member of the Fourteenth Finance Commission and Emeritus Professor, National Institute of Public...

-Scroll.in The author of a paper published by a research institute under the Ministry of Finance expands on its conclusions. The drying up of cash has thrown the lives of millions of Indians in disarray. But many facing hardship support the government’s move. In Barabanki, Uttar Pradesh, a farmer who did not have cash to buy seeds and fertilisers, said, “Now when rich people deposit money in the bank, the income tax people...

-Ideas for India In this article, Pronab Sen, Country Director for the India Central Programme of the International Growth Centre, argues that India’s recent demonetisation has penalised virtually the entire informal sector, and perhaps damaged it permanently. At the stroke of the midnight hour of 9 November 2016, India lost 86% of its monetary base. The media – print, electronic and social – has been fulsome in its praise of Prime Minister...

-HuffingtonPost.com As the poor struggle, black money owners are finding a variety of ways to save their Wealth. In Pali in Rajasthan, a family couldn't take their ill infant to the hospital because the ambulance wouldn't accept Rs 500 or 1,000 notes. By the time they could get someone to give them Rs 100 notes, the newborn had died. This is one of several such deaths after the government de-legalised Rs 500...