-Press release by FAO dated 6 July 2022 The latest State of Food Security and Nutrition report shows the world is moving backwards in efforts to eliminate hunger and malnutrition Rome/New York: The number of people affected by hunger globally rose to as many as 828 million in 2021, an increase of about 46 million since 2020 and 150 million since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic (1), according to a United...
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Agnipath: With 34 lakh military pensioners, pensions form >50% of defence budget -Vignesh Radhakrishnan, Rebecca Rose Varghese and Jasmin Nihalani
-The Hindu More than half the defence budget is allocated for pensions every year while less than 5% is allocated for research and development One key reason for the Agnipath scheme, which aims to recruit defence personnel in short-term contracts, could be to reduce increasing pension payments in the Army, Navy, and Air Force. More than half the defence budget is allocated for pensions every year while less than 5% is allocated...
More »Record Profits Boost Corporate Sector in Pandemic -Subodh Varma
-Newsclick.in This is in contrast to estimated 84% of Indian families reporting decline in their earnings due to pandemic related lockdowns and restrictions. The trend was visible from last year but the scale of profits reported by listed companies after the last financial year ended in March this year is nothing short of mind-boggling. According to latest data by CMIE or Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy, companies listed at the BSE (formerly...
More »What’s falling: Poverty or quality of analysis? -Santosh Mehrotra
-Deccan Herald Dodgy data Surjit Bhalla, India’s Executive Director (IMF), Arvind Virmani, former Chief Economic Advisor under UPA, and K Bhasin, in an IMF Working Paper, state that to estimate poverty, when no survey has been undertaken, is to take the most recent survey (2011-12) data and update individual consumption (or personal) income by the corresponding growth rate observed in the national accounts (NAS). However, there are problems with estimating poverty based on...
More »Will replacing PhD professors with practitioners work? -Siddharth Singh
-The Hindu Challenges abound in this approach, which needs to be analysed in depth before a policy is announced The University Grants Commission (UGC) has recently announced that it will do away with the mandatory PhD qualification to teach in Central Universities (CUs) spread across the country. It purportedly addresses a shortage of qualified faculty in CUs. According to the Ministry of Education data, there were 10,000 teaching positions lying vacant in...
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