Most of the respondents in Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Kerala prefer an effective PDS to cash transfer. THE survey of the public distribution system (PDS) in nine States, of which I was a part in Himachal Pradesh (Sirmaur district), Uttar Pradesh (Jaunpur district) and Kerala (Wayanad district), came as an eye-opener to me on many counts. If Himachal Pradesh stood out for the innocence of its people, Uttar Pradesh...

-The Times of India   Even though the residents of Guwahati have to buy their greens at exorbitant rates, farmers in the countryside are living in dire straits as the price at which they sell the vegetables have touched rock bottom. Last week, farmers in Barpeta, one of the vegetable-producing districts of the state, had to jettison cartloads of cucumbers on the street when the price of the produce touched 60 paise per...

The Rs.3,884-crore package for the handloom sector, which includes one-time waiver of overdue loans and interests, approved by the Union Cabinet, is expected to benefit about 3-lakh weavers and 15,000 cooperative societies, which would have access to institutional credit once again. However, the package will benefit only those who took loan before March 31, 2010. “There would be many weavers who had no access to institutional credit in the past and...

Global experience in retail trading by MNCs does not tally with the presumptions on which the UPA government's FDI policy is based. IN the course of the debate on the need to permit foreign direct investment in retail in India, two arguments have been advanced often. The first argument is that large organised retail is good for not just consumers, who would benefit from lower prices owing to cost efficiencies...

-The Indian Express   The government today claimed there has been an "impressive improvement" in the performance of the targeted public distribution system (TPDS), with leakage reduced to about 10-15 per cent on average now from 40 per cent earlier. "The leakage, on an average, is nearly 10-15 per cent," said Minister of State for Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution KV Thomas said in a reply during Question Hour in the Rajya Sabha. The...