-Down to Earth Women of a Maharashtra hamlet give husbands an ultimatum-build toilets or go without food TOILETS ARE not an issue over which one sees agitations every day. And when it comes to women agitating against husbands, it may well be an unprecedented situation. Yet, the women of Amgaon, a tiny village in Wardha district of Maharashtra, did just that. On June 24, they staged a choolband, or no-cooking protest, forcing...

-The Business Standard K'taka government has announced this to enhance the jowar and ragi production in the state Dharwad: The Karnataka State Agriculture Commission has come forward with plans to tag the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA) scheme with jowar and ragi farming to help the farmers overcome the problem of high labour component. Commission chairman Prakash Kammaradi said here on Monday that the state government had announced schemes to...

-PTI Govt has received a total of 3,641 complaints, of which 1,769 have been disposed of The government admitted to irregularities in implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), and said it has taken steps to rectify them and improve the scheme's delivery. Minister of State for Rural Development Upendra Kushwaha told the Rajya Sabha in a written reply that the ministry has established a comprehensive system of...

-The Indian Express The changes also aim to prohibit pregnant women and persons with disabilities from being assigned to machinery-in-motion. In its first major step towards overhauling the country's labour laws, the government on Wednesday cleared long-pending amendments to three critical laws in the sector that would enable a doubling of the overtime limit for workers, exemption for firms employing up to 40 workers from compliance of labour regulations and allow more...

-The Tribune The UPA's flagship programme MGNREGS changed the employment scene for the rural poor. While 100-day job guarantee was a novel step, loopholes and poor implementation rendered it a liability. The Modi govt hopes to gradually reinvent the scheme, if not entirely scrap it. Midway through the Congress-led UPA's second tenure - believed to be largely the courtesy of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) -...