The total expenditure on central schemes for the poor and on the major subsidies exceeds the states' share of central taxes. These schemes are chronic bad performers due to a culture of immunity in public administration and weakened local governments. Arguing that the poor should be trusted to use these resources better than the state, a radical redirection with substantial direct transfers to individuals and complementary decentralisation to local governments...

-Pratirodh.com If Year 2012 earned the sobriquet of “Year of Scams’ due to serial expose of “super social cop” Arvind Kejeriwal, and the year-end tragic death of girl in Delhi gang rape case reminded us about the most ugly manifestation of ‘Republic of Patriarchy’ in India, Year 2013 promises to be a game changer for the fortunes of welfare state in India as well as political fortunes of UPA-2.   If Narendra Modi,...

-The Hindu Majority of patients are utilising public health facilities in the State for chronic disease treatment An evaluation has ranked Tamil Nadu at the top for implementation outcomes of the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) and described it as a benchmark for other States. Analysis of data also reveals that in physical infrastructure per 1 lakh population with respect to Primary Health Centres, Community Health Centres, and First Reference Units, Jammu and...

-Economic and Political Weekly Extensive reforms are required so that sexually assaulted women do not feel they are the "accused" when they submit themselves for medical examination and trial. Urgent reforms such as setting up humane rape crisis centres where women can directly approach women counsellors to tell their story, lodge a complaint, and get examinations done at one place are required to improve the situation. Amita Pitre (amita@oxfamindia.org) is with Oxfam...

-The Times of India JAIPUR: Direct cash transfer scheme that was rolled out from January 1 this year in three pilot districts of Rajasthan is facing crippling absence of banking infrastructure and at this point it's anybody's guess when the banks can do their part to provide legs to the UPA-II's ambitious project. One of the pillar's of the project was to have banking correspondents (BCs) in the unbanked villages so that...