-The Hindu   Far from being ‘useless’, the MNREGA helps the impoverished and resilient poor earn a decent living. Famously on the floor of Parliament, Prime Minister Modi dismissed the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA) as a ‘living monument’ of the previous governments’ failures, condemning millions of impoverished people to survive by ‘digging ditches’. This spring near Bhim in Rajasthan, I had the rare experience of labouring on an MGNREGA site....

-The Indian Express The average days of employment provided per household, too, fell to 40.01 from 45.97 in 2013-14 and 46.20 in 2012-13. From Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s public barbs against its being a “living proof” of 60 years of Congress misrule, to a proposal now for extending the annual work entitlement to 150 days in drought-affected areas, the BJP-led government’s disposition towards the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Act (MGNREGA)...

-The Financial Express The Narendra Modi government has pledged to employ all machinery at its disposal to deal with a second straight year of deficient monsoon. The Narendra Modi government has pledged to employ all machinery at its disposal to deal with a second straight year of deficient monsoon and denied an impending distress in the vulnerable pockets of the country, but a dispassionate look at the ground situation would show there...

-Deccan Herald Poor monsoon forcing govt to intensify implementation Notwithstanding the scathing attack on UPA’s schemes, the Modi government would fall back on the previous regime’s flagship programme to rescue the rural economy from second consecutive deficient monsoon. The government would intensify implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) in drought hit areas to stop the slide in rural incomes. Officials revealed that the main thrust in MGNREGA implementation in drought affected...

-Hindustan Times Policy makers have no control over fickle weather whims and complex forecasts. Regardless of the eventual course and quality of summer rains brought on by drafts of breeze that stream 8,000 km from the southern Pacific, the early predictions did give an early heads up of what was likely in the next few months. Yet, every drought year, India’s response to deal with scanty summer rains has been knee-jerk, marked...