-The Asian Age Amarjeet Sinha said it was a myth that people were losing work for not having Aadhaar cards. New Delhi: The central government extended the cut off date for 100 per cent Aadhaar coverage in the MGNREGA to September 30, instead of the earlier deadline of March 31. The move comes after the Centre faced widespread criticism from civil society activists over making Aadhaar compulsory for getting work under the...

-Hindustan Times Ranchi: Jharkhand’s bureaucrats have denied thousands of farm workers their legally mandated livelihoods under the guise of plugging leakages in the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), say activists. Earlier this month, HT reported that the ministry of rural development had cancelled 93 lakh MGNREGA Job Cards — of which 2.67 lakh cards were from Jharkhand — to weed out duplicates and cards corresponding to dead beneficiaries. At the...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: Activists and researchers today accused the Centre of systematically curtailing the 100-day rural job scheme by not releasing funds for the payment of beneficiaries, diluting norms to avoid giving compensation and cancelling cards of genuine job-seekers. They said payments to around 10 crore poor workers were getting delayed because of the lack of funds. The Union rural development ministry denied the charges. At a news conference, Nikhil Dey of the...

-Hindustan Times Eminent social scientist Jean Dreze has alleged that MGNREGS job cards have been cancelled in some states to meet targets of linking them with the Aadhaar project. Dreze’s remarks come amid a political row over the government’s attempt to expand the mandatory use of the country’s unique identity scheme. The scheme, launched under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, ensures employment to the rural population through one job...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: Tens of thousands of people who relocated from riot-torn areas of Muzaffarnagar to areas with minority concentration find themselves out of the government's grid even three years after the violence forced them to flee their homes. This is the main finding of a survey conducted by NGOs Aman Biradari and Afkar India of the 65 colonies that have come up in Muzaffarnagar and Shamli to house the 30,000...