-The Business Standard A panel headed by Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia has advocated the use of unique identification numbers to plug loopholes in the public distribution system (PDS). The working group on PDS reforms, which finalised its draft report today, has also suggested a nationwide computerised system for tracking transportation and distribution of PDS items. “We have approved the draft report and will give it to the Prime Minister...

In developing societies political parties exercise an influential role. They aim to achieve power and after having achieved it they wish to maintain it by several mechanisms; besides less awareness of the people about the true nature of the democratic system in such societies, there exist limited options to bring the government within a people-centric corruption-free framework. In these societies the civil society too exists but in underdeveloped form. The situation...

Those of us interested in gender equality tend to be obsessed with the politically and economically important areas in which we need this equality — education, employment, health, political representation. But equality in these important but grim attributes leaves out many things that actually make life more enjoyable and thus more worth living. Women deserve more from gender equality than better housekeeping and management skills. In most societies, men are much...

On a muggy Saturday morning I was waiting on platform No.12 at the New Delhi Railway station to receive my family returning from Varanasi. The train was delayed by 40 minutes and I decided to stroll around the station to kill time. I had filth, stench and chaos for company. Suddenly, I saw a clump of about 15 people hemming something lying on the ground. I broke through the cordon...

Optimise number of affiliated colleges under one university. Shift from affiliation to autonomy. Rank cradles. Train teachers. Implement graduate employment survey… These were some of the many smart solutions that surfaced during the maiden deliberations on higher education between World Bank experts and Jharkhand academics here today. The daylong workshop — Higher Education in Jharkhand: the Way Forward — brought together key policy-makers, renowned academics and stakeholders under one umbrella to prepare...