Former Union Panchayat Raj Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar, lately in the news for denouncing the Commonwealth Games, is aiming his guns much closer to the UPA government’s heart, at the way it is implementing the flagship National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). He is joining forces with like-minded critics of the Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council (NAC) such as economist-actvist Jean Dreze to drive home the fact that its basic promises...

Kendriya Vidyalayas will no longer be the sole preserve of children of government employees. From the next academic year, 981 KVs will start implementing the Right to Education Act and give 25% reservation to poor children in the neighbourhood. Highly placed sources in the HRD ministry said, "RTE will be implemented in KVs. We are working out the details. We have enough time before the next session begins." To ensure...

The fall of Ram Babu Kateliya, 60-year-old farmer from Kateliya village of Mathura district, was as fast as his meteoric rise within the past ten days. General Secretary of Kisan Sangharsh Samiti, an apolitical organisation, Kateliya shot into limelight after his arrest in Tappal tehsil of Aligarh while leading a farmers' agitation demanding high compensation for farmers whose land has been acquired for construction of a township. Three villagers lost...

Anganwadi workers, women’s self-help groupsand accredited social health activists from across the state gathered at the Azad Maidan on Wednesday to protest against the government’s decision of distributing instant packaged food in anganwadis as supplementary nutrition. “Anganwadis are supposed to provide fresh, nutritious food to pregnant women and children till six years of age. The government has instead started providing ready-to-eat food packets to them,” said Sonya Gill, president, all India...

Governor M..H. Farook today declared eight more districts as drought-hit, bringing the entire state in the parched bracket ahead of a central team visit. With this, the memorandum of demands to be forwarded to the Union government, seeking financial assistance to mitigate the effects of drought, will be redesigned. It is now pegged at around Rs 3,000 crore against the earlier Rs 2,157 crore. An eight-member central team, led by managing director...