The report of the Rangarajan Committee scrutinizing proposals of the National Advisory Council for the National Food Security Bill makes for a very instructive read. It's official now: UPA II is on a death wish, and it could not have been articulated better. The alacrity with which the prime minister set up this committee (remember, he could not find time in three years to convene the nutrition council he chairs)...
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Diluting the Right to Food by CP Chandrasekhar
The promise made by UPA II that it will ensure food security for Indians through legislation that guarantees the Right to Food seems, in its view, to have been an error. In a multi-stage process that reflects the pulls and pressures within the policy-making elite, the Food Security Bill has been diluted so much that it marks a reversal rather than an advance compared to the status quo. Let us...
More »Kind to cash by Richard Mahapatra
The government has a plan to reach welfare to the poor without wasting money. It wants to put hard cash in their hands instead of spending on welfare programmes. To begin with, it wants to end the public distribution system of food grain and give money directly to the people. Its logic: the new system of cash transfer will plug leakages and save an enormous amount of money. But is it...
More »Govt unveils health plan for elderly by Kounteya Sinha
India has finally woken up to the needs of the country's elderly. With the number of people in the 60-plus age group in India expected to increase to 100 million in 2013 and to 198 million in 2030, the health ministry is all set to roll out the National Programme for the Health Care of the Elderly (NPHCE). A ministry note, available with TOI, estimates that the elderly population will increase to 12% of...
More »Neoliberal illogic by Prabhat Patnaik
The class bias in government policy is clear in the decision to release a small amount of foodgrain in the open market to tackle inflation. MOST people would agree that there is a strong element of speculation underlying the current inflation and that forward trading contributes to it. Yet the government, though it has banned forward trading in certain commodities under public pressure, is curiously reluctant to see this point....
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