-PTI Aiming to strengthen the functioning of Panchayati Raj institutions, Centre has advised state governments to videograph gram sabha proceedings,besides introducing a slew of schemes for improving their set up. "The scheme will start from 2012-13, that is the first year of 12th Five Year Plan. It will require the states to undertake reforms, devolve funds, strengthen state election commissions and finance commission and set up Mahila Sabhas," Union Minister for Panchayati...

-The Hindu Love marriages, unescorted visits to the market and even the use of mobile phones — women up to the age of 40 in Uttar Pradesh’s Bagpat area can have none of these. The decision, which seems inspired by a Taliban-style diktat, has been taken by the panchayat in the Baraut tehsil of Bagpat, ostensibly to safeguard women from “teasing.” The panchayat issued a “farman” (diktat) barring women up to the...

Ramesh Singh, an Intelligence Bureau officer and resident of Sonepur under Chhapra, has an MNREGA job card bearing registration number 914. Singh had never applied for it, nor did he know about its issuance Uday Kumar Dwivedi, employed in the Indian Navy, is a resident of Jaitiya village under Jahangirpur panchayat of Sonepur, Chhapra. He was also issued a job card (311). He, too, does not know about it and had...

-The Business Standard When the anti-Posco brigade celebrated the seventh anniversary of their agitation against the mega steel venture of the South Korean behemoth at Dhinkia near Paradip in Odisha last week, the noise they made against the project was drowned by the murmurs of a split in their ranks. After fighting against the project for the last seven years, Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS) seems to be disintegrating, with many of...

-The Hindu Business Line DHARMASTHALA, JUNE 23: Chartered Accountants will begin certification of accounts under MGNREGA scheme at village panchayat level from April 2013. Addressing presspersons on the sidelines of the 30-year celebrations of the Shri Kshetra Rural Development Project (SKDRDP) at Dharmasthala in Dakshina Kannada district on Friday, Mr Jairam Ramesh, Union Minister for Rural Development, said that the accounts of the 2012-13 will be audited at village panchayat levels by...