-Down to Earth UPA gives sops under MGNREGS to attract rural voters ahead of elections WITH most of its recent schemes struggling, a desperate UPA government is pinning its hopes on Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) to win votes in 2014 elections. The government is overhauling the employment scheme that helped it return to power in 2009 for a reason. It touches the lives of over 55 per cent...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: It is well known that quality of life greatly varies amongst different states within India. Some states have greater industrial or agricultural output, higher income levels, better educational and health indicators while others are still struggling with backwardness. But what is much less known is that within states too there are wide and astonishing variations. State level averages often hide huge and unconscionable disparity on...

-The Hindu Looking to capture demand effectively for its flagship scheme Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), the Ministry of Rural Development will pro-actively register demand in select districts of the country. The Ministry has launched a "Kaam Mango Abhiyan" after recognising that the decline in people demanding work under MGNREGA is not necessarily due to a lack of demand but caused by a failure to capture demand effectively. This...

-Down to Earth 'Kaam Mango Abhiyan' aims to popularise the ambitious flagship programme of the UPA government In the view of the declining demand of work under the ambitious Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), Union Ministry of Rural Development (MoRD) has launched a campaign "Kaam Mango Abhiyan", which literally means "ask for work". Rural development minister Jairam Ramesh launched the awareness campaign last week. To begin with, the focus will...

-The Business Standard A third of Indians migrate, but government ignores them A recent UNESCO report reveals how widely prevalent migration within India has become, and has once again revived the apparently endless debate on whether this trend should be curbed or encouraged. Under the United Progressive Alliance government, internal migration has been seen as a sign of distress rather than of aspiration, and thus there have been various bids to control...