Conditional cash transfers” (CCTs) are a new buzzword in policy circles. The idea is simple: give poor people cash conditional on good behaviour such as sending children to school. This helps to score two goals in one shot: poor people get some income support, and at the same time, they take steps to lift themselves out of poverty. CCT enthusiasm, however, is often based on a superficial reading of the Latin...
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Counting Poorly by Anuradha Raman
The Planning Commission’s definition of poverty is inexplicable In the urban sprawl that is Delhi, as in any other metro in the country, earning no more than Rs 25 per day with a family to support would prove nightmarish. Food and clothes have to be bought, there may be school-going children, colds, fevers or upset stomachs to get treated, someone with a chronic problem needing long-term treatment. Surely, someone living...
More »Targeted PDS is a failure: Plan Panel member
-The Economic Times A day after the Work Bank marked out deficiencies in the country's public distribution system (PDS) for foodgrain, a senior government official has said that restricting public distribution to below poverty line (BPL) households has been a failure in India. "The mess in the public distribution system has been created by the notion that it is only meant for the poor. All problems of the current system are...
More »Stupid to abolish PDS, says Plan panel’s Abhijit Sen
-The Indian Express A day after the World Bank suggested that India should shrink its public distribution system (PDS) in favour of more cash transfers, Planning Commission Member (Agriculture) Abhijit Sen told select mediapersons it would be “stupid to abolish PDS”. A World Bank review of India’s social sector programmes titled “Social protection for a changing India”, commissioned by the Planning Commission, said though the PDS costs just 1 per cent...
More »World Bank endorses cash-transfer of food subsidy to poor
-FnBNews The World Bank, like many analysts, is in favour of cash-transfer of subsidy for foodgrains to the poor in India. This suggestion was made in a recent report on Social Protection for a Changing India, drafted by the World Bank for the Government of India. Using the National Sample Survey data, the report stated that the Public Distribution System (PDS) continued to absorb substantial public resources at almost 1 per...
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