The sixth meeting of the National Advisory Council, chaired by Congress president Sonia Gandhi, Saturday finalised its recommendations to address the problems of hunger and malnutrition in the country. Some of the important recommendations: - Legal entitlements to subsidised foodgrains should be extended to 90 percent rural population and 50 percent urban population. - The priority households should have a monthly entitlement of 35 kg at a subsidised price of Re.1 per kg...

The National Advisory Council (NAC), headed by Sonia Gandhi, on Saturday recommended to the government to grant differential legal entitlement of foodgrains to nearly 800 million people through a reformed PDS network from the next financial year. The NAC also decided to set aside the BPL criteria and suggested two broad categories — priority and general — eligible for legal foodgrain entitlement under the proposed food security law. As per the recommendations,...

75% of population to get 35 kg of foodgrains; 20 kg for rest After months of hard bargaining with the Planning Commission and the government, the Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council (NAC) on Saturday appeared to have got a consensus on a universal food security system with legal guarantees, even though with differential entitlements. However, the NAC has expanded the concept of below the poverty line (BPL)-PDS beneficiaries, virtually doubling their number...

The National Advisory Council, headed by Congress President Sonia Gandhi, on Saturday settled for a much less ambitious National Food Security Act than it had previously agreed to. Scaling down its recommendations, it decided to recommend subsidised foodgrains for 46% of the rural Indian population and 28% of the urban population. The pruning of the recommendation had an immediate fallout, with the NAC member Jean Dreaze, face of the right-to-food security campaign,...

The Central Government has consented for setting up of International Millet and Wheat Research Centre at Khamaria near Jabalpur. This Research Centre will be set up with cooperation of Mexico. Here research will be conducted for producing hybrid quality seeds of Millets and Wheat. In view of the dwindling wheat production because of the increase in global temperature, the centre will research for producing hybrid quality millet and wheat seeds...