To perpetuate a system that assigns a household to a single BPL/APL category in circumstances in which poverty is multi-dimensional is not only bad economics, but unconscionable as well.  The pilot surveys for the next Census of BPL (below-poverty-line) households are due to begin. Discussions are now on to finalise the methodology for the survey, and as the BPL Census is a matter of the subsistence and survival of hundreds...

For purposes of food security, the Planning Commission today finally accepted that the number of people living below the poverty line in India is 37.2 per cent of the total population. The Plan panel, mandated by the empowered group of ministers chaired by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee to finalise the BPL numbers, will now meet the secretaries of food and expenditure on Tuesday to calculate the cost of providing food security...

There will be no census exercise in several hundred villages in Chhattisgarh which have been rendered out of bounds for government officials by Naxalite groups. District administrations of Jagdalpur, Dantewada, Bijapur, Narayanpur and Kanker, all part of undivided Bastar which was once one of the largest districts in the country, have informed senior officials in Raipur that it will be difficult for them to carry out the census exercise — counting...

A MARRIAGE hall in Kolkata is packed with 1200 of India’s poorest citizens. They have trekked here from all over West Bengal, from remote forests and dingy alleyways, from Howrah, East Midnapore, South 24 Parganas. They have come because there is a story to tell, a brutal story that may otherwise never be told. Finally, there are people willing to hear. These people may never bring justice; may never be...

The provision on non-discrimination under the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, 1995 will not apply to private employers, whether individuals, partnerships, proprietary concerns or companies (other than government companies) or unaided schools, the Supreme Court has held. According to Section 47 ‘Non-discrimination in government employment', no establishment shall dispense with, or reduce in rank, an employee who acquires a disability during his service: Provided...