Rajasthan’s Chief Information Commissioner, Mr. MD Kaurani, had to beat a hasty retreat when he came to face the information seekers at a packed social audit event at the auditorium of the Humanities Department of Rajasthan University in Jaipur on Monday. The hall was packed to capacity with people who had gathered there to voice their grievances in the presence of the Commissioner.   The biggest complaint of the information seekers, who...

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is confident that the NREGS is his best bet to offset the drought but many grassroots activists are unsure of the scheme’s effectiveness, especially after some recent amendments. While the drought has spread to 246 districts, a heated debate rages on the poor peoples’ entitlements versus rural asset formation, even though in theory the two positions appear complementary. 14 organisations throughout the country are up in arms...

The tragic demise of Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy is a blow to the rights approach to development in India. YSR, as the medical doctor-turned-CM was popularly known, was a pioneer of at least one hundred path breaking rural schemes such as the NREGS and old age pensions that were offered to the poor not as dole but as a matter of right. For records, the first...

Before tinkering with the NREGA in the name of reforms, the government must ensure that the foundations of the scheme are strengthened. No change should be introduced without a rigorous debate that centrally involves its primary constituents.  As the Union Ministry of Rural Development attempts to craft the architecture of what is being referred to as “NREGA 2,” the principles that constitute the basic foundation of the National Rural Employment...

The time has come for a comprehensive right-to-food law to tackle the deprivation and food insecurity that haunts India.  Over the last decade or so, a series of developments have drawn attention to the problem of food security. These are the persistence of hunger in many parts of the country being juxtaposed with food surpluses and stocks; the adverse impact of globalisation on agriculture and rising food prices resulting in...