-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Inequality in South Asia is much more glaring than what government data shows because standard yardsticks of measuring income don't reveal the true picture, says a World Bank report 'Addressing Inequality in South Asia', released on Tuesday. For instance, the Gini coefficient - the standard measure to gauge income inequality - ranges from 0.28 to 0.40 in this region, suggesting a level of inequality much lower...

The tribal or the Scheduled Tribe communities constitute only 8.6 percent of India's population and yet, they are around 40 percent of those displaced due to ‘development’ projects. In the midst of a raging debate on the new Land Acquisition Ordinance, a new report brings out many such paradoxes of development versus displacement of India’s indigenous or Adivasi people. The report exposes the anomalies of land alienation, displacement and forced...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The Narendra Modi government may introduce a health cess to fund free health care services and launch seven preventive campaigns to curb illnesses under a draft health policy unveiled today. Some analysts, however, said the draft of the National Health Policy 2015 lacked emphasis on regulating India's private health industry, necessary to curb the high cost of health care. The draft says the government has the "political will" to...

-The Hindu Business Line The rural job guarantee scheme is threatened by the undermining of its driving force, demand-driven work Is the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) suffering a midlife crisis or are we staring at its death? From a budget of ₹401 billion in 2010-11, it has plummeted to ₹330 billion in 2013-14. Given the much higher wages currently offered to workers, it has taken a serious hit. The...

-The Hans India It is official now. New data released by the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) for 2013 show that the agrarian distress in rural India is continuing, and even intensifying for small and marginal farmers. In the last decade, there has been much talk on inclusive growth, revival of growth rates in agriculture, higher public investment in agriculture and the doubling of agricultural credit. Yet, the new data show...