-The Hindu Union Rural Development Minister Chaudhary Birender Singh on Friday assured the Lok Sabha that the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) was not being diluted and added that state governments were also to be blamed for delay in payments. Responding to a discussion in the Lok Sabha on "the reported dilution of MGNREGA," Mr. Singh said payments were getting delayed because many State Governments failed to submit...

-Frontline The Left and other national parties protest against the NDA government's attempts to dilute the MGNREGS by limiting its budget and reducing its reach. IN a rare show of solidarity, representatives of several political parties took issue with the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government on its controversial proposal to restructure the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS). The opposition, which was initially confined to the...

-The Hindu Madurai: Solar energy is conquering more territories with increasing industrial application. In Theni district, it has become popular among dhal mills. Besides conserving considerable fossil fuel, solar heating used in the processing of dhal also helps to keep the environment around the Western Ghats clean. Solar heat processor developed by Planters' Energy Network (PEN) is now used in big dhal processing units in Theni. The process starts with harvesting of...

-Livemint The development economist on the Modi government's initiatives and his stand on them, and MGNREGS The Narendra Modi-led government should consider replacing inefficient subsidies with a basic monthly income for all citizens, says Pranab Bardhan , emeritus professor of economics at the University of California at Berkeley. Bardhan, who recently sparred with economists Jagdish Bhagwati and Arvind Panagariya in a debate over the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS),...

-The Indian Express In a move that could alter the labour-intensive nature of the rural job guarantee scheme, the Finance Ministry has suggested changing the wage-material ratio from the current 60:40 - as provided under the Act - to an equal 50:50. This comes amid widespread criticism from several quarters of previous Rural Development minister Nitin Gadkari's proposal to change the labour-material ratio to 51:49. According to officials in the Rural Development Ministry,...