-The Indian Express There is evidence to suggest that with a few modifications, MGNREGA can dent poverty. There are few government programmes that excite as much passion as the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA). For advocates, it is a lifeline for the rural poor. For critics, it is a programme that distorts labour markets and does far more harm than good. In this partisan quicksand, it is hard to...
More »SEARCH RESULT
Will the JAM Trinity Dismantle the PDS? -Silvia Masiero
-Economic and Political Weekly The platform known as the JAM Trinity (an acronym for Jan Dhan Yojana, Aadhaar and mobile numbers) may enable a shift from the current Public Distribution System, based on price subsidies, to the direct transfer of benefits. However, it is incorrect to argue that JAM technologies will necessarily lead to the demise of the PDS. State-level experiences of computerisation, recounted here, reveal that the same technologies can...
More »Radio faces Mann ki blast -Sumi Sukanya
-The Telegraph New Delhi: The Narendra Modi government is preparing to crack down on community radio stations for failing to broadcast the Prime Minister's monthly radio programme, Mann ki Baat, and for airing "anti-government" views. The Union information and broadcasting ministry, after a scrutiny of the content of some 30 community radio stations in the National Capital Region, has found broadcasts from most of the stations "objectionable", officials said. "These radio stations that...
More »Farmers Cry Foul Over GM Mustard Cultivation -Aditi R
-The New Indian Express CHENNAI: Five years ago, the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government had put an indefinite moratorium on the commercial cropping of Monsanto’s Bt Brinjal. However now, the Centre is considering commercial cultivation of a genetically modified hybrid variety of mustard. Following news reports on the move of the application for approval of GM Mustard to the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee in the Ministry of Environment, Forests & Climate Change...
More »They don’t go to the field -Harish Damodaran
-The Indian Express There is a worrying dearth of Indian economists working on agriculture today. In his classic Money: Whence It Came, Where It Went, John Kenneth Galbraith observed how the economics profession had a well-defined order of precedence. At the top were the economic theorists and specialists in banking and finance. At the bottom of the hierarchy were agricultural economists. George F. Warren from Cornell University was even worse — a...
More »