In April this year, activists dealing with food security wanted to know from people in Katar village in Rajasthan’s Bhilwara district whether the information uploaded on a website where PDS has been linked to Aadhaar was correct. A
This government is not listening to its own experts. The Economic Survey had a word of caution over the pilot exercises for giving cash instead of PDS, yet the Narendra Modi government has decided to scrap PDS and move towards direct benefit tra
The cabinet has approved the scrapping of the no-detention policy in schools till Class VIII and students will now have to take exams in class V and VIII. This has been done as the quality of education has dipped, especially in government sc
Tobacco is a major preventable cause of death and disease globally. It is a threat to development, environment, society and economy. Many countries have strengthened their tobacco control legislation, guided by the World Health Organisation’
The scrapping of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency had a positive impact in the fight against terror in the country; the Rajya Sabha was informed on Wednesday. Since illegally held cash forms the major chunk of terror f
It is time for the Food Corporation of India (FCI) to take on a new avatar as the prime minister has spoken about scrapping the Public Distribution System (PDS). FCI should ideally lead the food management system, instead of being just an ordina
In what is a clear shift in handling Pakistan-sponsored terrorism in Kashmir by the Narendra Modi government, the Jammu and Kashmir police, has, for the first time, refused to hand over the body of a Pakistani terrorist killed in counterinsurgency
In one of those little paradoxes, the parliamentarians’ pays and perks are decided by nobody other than they themselves. Feroze Varun Gandhi, the BJP MP from Sultanpur who has been championing a plethora of political reforms in recent mont
It’s a question that needed asking. Is it kosher for a state (or a state-run enterprise) to invest in profitable tobacco companies when it professes an anti-tobacco stance, educates people against tobacco use, and ends up losing productive c
A single adverse entry in the annual confidential report (ACR) of a government official can be enough to ruin a promising career. Many officials decide to take premature retirement as their chances of promotion are scuttled when they get a &lsqu
The killing of Abu Dujana, head of Lashkar-e-Toiba in Kashmir, is the culmination of years of efforts of the army and police to trap this hardcore Pakistani terrorist around whom folk tales were circulated by the propaganda machinery of separatist
The country`s rural health infrastructure is in a bad shape and this is evident from the statistics provided by the ministry of health family welfare in the Lok Sabha during the ongoing monsoon session. The data reveals that a tota
Tobacco companies are not known to be the fairest of fighters in market battles. But Philip Morris International (PMI) seems to have gone to extremes in its grand strategy to sweep the Indian market, where an estimated 2 million people take up smo
Over centuries, marijuana in some form or other has been used in India. Its use was made illegal in 1985. That decision, which is now over 30-years old, is being revisited, with the government looking at legalising its use for medical purposes.
As Zahida Shabnam, a history professor and a television anchor, stepped into one of the ghettoes of the Gadiya Lohar community in Jaipur on a sunny Saturday recently, the women there did not seem too keen to let her mingle with them. In her blue c
The ‘Jiyo Parsi’ scheme, started by the ministry of minority affairs, aims to reverse the decline in the Parsi population in India by adopting scientific medical protocols and structured interventions.
It’s been over six months since then Tamil Nadu chief minister J Jayalalithaa died, yet it is still not clear who would finally get to own the sprawling bungalow at Poes Garden and her other properties. Legal experts s
TRAI chief RS Sharma, who was the director general of UIDAI at its inception, sits down with Governance Now journalists to talk about how the ambitious project was conceived. He also dispels the misconceptions surrounding it Read:
Union minister for electronics and IT Ravi Shankar Prasad has fiercely defended Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) amid repeated occurrence of data breach and unauthorised disclosure. The position maintained by many in the gove
As many as 1.78 lakh Shiksha Mitras (ad hoc teachers) have boycott classes, locked up some schools and blocked roads to protest against the supreme court order that quashed their appointment. Two Shiksha Mitras have committed suici
