Some 48,315 tonnes of wheat procured by the Punjab government is to be fed to cattle after being declared unfit for human consumption. The stock, enough to feed around 595,000 people through the public distribution system (PDS) for a year, had piled up over the previous three years. Officials at the Food Corporation of India (FCI), which declared the grains unfit after an inquiry in March, said Punjab’s procurement agencies had...
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rice husk power to light up villages
Three years after lighting up the electricity-deprived remote villages in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh with power harnessed through rice husk, the team behind the venture is now undertaking a similar task in West Bengal and Tamil Nadu. Beginning with Tamkuha in Bihar, the ‘Husk Power System' designed by NRI entrepreneur Gyanesh Pandey has gone on to dispel darkness in over 125 villages since 2007. “The conventional technologies and grids had...
More »Instead of feeding the poor, India lets grain rot by Samar Halarnkar & Manpreet Randhawa
A day after the Prime Minister urged a quick start to a national food security network, it has emerged that his government may let foodgrain —enough to feed 140 million poor people for a month—decay, instead of spending money and effort distributing it to the poor. Warning of an “emergency situation”, a person familiar with the situation told the Hindustan Times that 17.8 million tonnes of wheat and rice are being...
More »Detracting from entitlements by Brinda Karat
The National Advisory Council's proposals on the Food Security Bill represent a bad deal for the poor. The struggle for an effective and equitable Food Security Bill (FSB) has received a setback with the disappointing proposals put forward by the National Advisory Council. There is a disturbing disjuncture between what is being claimed and the actual implications of the proposals. Indeed it may be said that the NAC proposals create new...
More »Along the food chain by MK Venu
Politicians, from the ruling party and opposition alike, are grappling with the problem of how to effectively communicate with their constituencies on the issue of high food inflation. One had thought it would be easy for the opposition to mount a campaign on rising prices against the ruling coalition, but it appears that inflation and its impact on the political economy is far more complex today than it was 10...
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