-The Economic Times The positive impact on agricultural wages and distress migration from rural areas not withstanding, the government's flagship rural employment scheme, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, leaves a lot to be desired for. This is evident from the rural development ministry's compendium of more than 100 major research papers on the programme, MGNREGA Sameeksha. The slim 120-odd page volume, which is to be released by the Prime Minister...

-The Telegraph The Prime Minister today expressed surprise that “concurrent evaluation” of the rural job scheme was “not in good shape” and asked Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia to “apply his mind to making good this deficiency”. Concurrent evaluation is an assessment of a scheme’s impact, strength and weaknesses while it is being implemented, as distinct from the annual CAG audit or a post-mortem. Its objective is to identify problems...

Model community forestry initiatives in Orissa are defying Forest Department efforts to control and exploit the region’s forests. ‘Heaven is a forest of miles and miles of Mohua trees / And hell is a forest of miles and miles of Mohua trees with a forest guard in it!’ Thus goes a song of the Muria Adivasis in the forests of Bastar in central India. Encapsulated in this simple expression, however, is...

Bhubaneswar : A year after the CBI probed into the irregularities across six districts of Orissa, a special performance audit of the implementation of the NREGS programme by the Comptroller and Auditor General has found misappropriation of funds through ghost workers, uneconomic execution of the works, delay in payment, and irregular maintenance of records still plaguing the scheme. The Supreme Court last year ordered a CBI probe following a writ petition...

-The Times of India Highlighting irregularities and delays in the issuing of BPL and ration cards, the CAG report has slammmed the food and supplies department for its functioning. The department’s failure to identify beneficiaries for its schemes, and under utilisation of foodgrains, kerosene oil and funds also find a mention in the report.  “It cannot be safely concluded that the food management system in Delhi was functioning in a transparent and...