-The Business Standard Full country coverage, in stages, by April 2014 UIDAI, FinMin given prime responsibility to work with ministries, states for national coverage The government today made its intention clear of exploiting an Aadhaar-based direct cash transfer system as a political plank in the next Lok Sabha polls, due in 2014. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today cleared the schedule for implementation from January 1 of government subsidies and entitlements to beneficiaries...

-The Indian Express Cash transfers seem to be the latest fad. With elections looming, the Prime Minister’s National Committee on Direct Cash Transfers has been tasked with an ambitious mandate to provide vision and direction to enable direct cash transfers of subsidies under various government schemes and programmes to individuals to enhance efficiency. Certain activists warn against an ill-considered and hasty transition from food to cash. Others believe directly transferring the...

-The Hindu Jairam to write to Prime Minister seeking more coverage The demand for universal pension for elderly persons got a fillip with President Pratibha Patil on Thursday extending her support and Union Minister for Rural Development Jairam Ramesh deciding to write to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to restructure the pension scheme to cover more beneficiaries. Ms. Patil made a personal contribution of Rs. 15,000 to the Pension Parishad which is staging a...

Just in case our friends in the media were looking for more evidence, a new ILO report clinches the connection between old age pension and a country’s well being. The ILO report “World Social Security Report 2010/11: Providing coverage in times of crisis and beyond” puts India’s social security coverage in perspective of its peers. (the report can be accessed at http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---dgreports/---dcomm/---publ/documents/publication/wcms_146566.pdf.  India is not only nearly at the bottom...

With the elderly likely to constitute a quarter of India's population by 2050, there is need for a publicly-funded, universal scheme that will overcome destitution among the aged India's social security system is woefully inadequate, when compared even to those in third world economies with no higher per capita incomes. Some States in India have fairly comprehensive social security schemes — notably Kerala, also West Bengal and Tamil Nadu — but...