Latin America, the poster child of bad economic policy in the 1980s and early 1990s, is leading the way in one rapidly evolving area of social development: conditional cash transfer (CCT) programmes. These schemes provide cash payments to poor households that meet certain behavioural requirements, generally related to children’s healthcare and education. The idea here is to support minimal levels of consumption through income transfers, while encouraging long-term human development. The...

Banks will have to put in place a mechanism to verify that microfinance institutes (MFI) they finance do not charge exorbitant rates to the final borrowers. The finance ministry has asked banks to ensure that MFIs, whom banks are financing, do not lend at rates more than 24% — all inclusive rates — to the ultimate borrowers. Some banks have recently inserted a clause while lending to MFIs that they...

Teacher absenteeism continues, despite several studies conducted and reasons identified. Can something be done? Another Teacher’s Day has come and gone. Like the ones before it, we have had the usual combination of speeches (New Delhi), awards (Mohali), “felicitations” (Mangalore), blood donations (Ulhasnagar), walkouts (Shillong), food poisonings (Mumbai), teacher thrashings (Malda) and black badges (Ludhiana). Barely a week later, we are back to the status quo. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, on whose birthday...

KEY TRENDS   • Maternal Mortality Ratio for India was 370 in 2000, 286 in 2005, 210 in 2010, 158 in 2015 and 145 in 2017. Therefore, the MMRatio for the country decreased by almost 61 percent between 2000 and 2017 *14    • As per the NSS 71st round, among rural females aged 5-29 years, the main reasons for dropping out/ discontinuance were: engagement in domestic activities, not interested in education, financial constraints and marriage. Among rural males aged...

A logo for the Right to Information (RTI) Act, designed by a faculty of the National Institute of Design (NID), created quite a buzz in Ahmedabad on Wednesday. But the revelation, it seems, has not gone down too well with RTI activists in the city. They have not only expressed their displeasure by saying the process lacks ‘transparency’, but also filed an RTI seeking details pertaining to the entire process. The...