In your view how cash transfer in PDS has fared in Puducherry? In my view the scheme is absolutely successful. It is one of the experiments that have worked very well. Prima
Eighty-year-old Shakunthala is hardly able to stand steady on her feet. With slumped shoulders and hunched back she came to the Puducherry civil supplies and consumer affairs office to complain tha
Two years ago 58-year-old Kuldeep Kumar Goyal received enough ration from the local fair price shop to feed his family of four. Goyal, a daily wage earner, lives with his wife Rajrani and two sons
Can you explain the cash transfer system under NFSA, 2013? The law categorises beneficiaries as priority households and antyodaya anna yojana (AAY) families. The AAY famili
Technology and e-governance have a transformational potential of making public services accessible and efficient, and helps in making governments responsive and accountable. As part of Digital Indi
Should the state give food grains and other ration items to the needy people or should the state give them just enough cash to buy these items themselves? That was the ‘cash-vs-PDS’ deb
There is no dearth of government policies and programmes to ensuring food for all; questions can be raised only about their effective implementation, says National Human Rights Commission chairpers
Over 30 crore people were benefitted through Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) in 2015-16 as
The stench is unbearable in the dingy lanes of Sanjay Colony of Okhla, south Delhi, where sunlight barely seeps in. An overflooded drain running along the lanes adds to the distressing picture. The
The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India has strongly contested the government’s claim of having saved several thousands of crores through the direct benefit transfer for LPG (DBTL)
The direct benefits transfer (DBT) was supposed to be the original ‘game-changer’ – in the words of the then finance minister P Chidambaram when it was announced in late 2012. It
The direct benefits transfer (DBT) was supposed to be the original ‘game-changer’ – in the words of the then finance minister P Chidambaram when it was announced in late 2012. DBT
Ever since the unique identity number, or Aadhaar, was introduced in India, it has carefully avoided spelling out its status – whether it is mandatory or not. The official stance, even after
The government`s expenditure on subsidies sustaining the public distribution system (PDS), meant to provide subsidised foodgrain, have risen over the years while the ratio of people below the pover
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
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 decide
Address: Homeless It’s a strange address: Homeless, Basti Nizamuddin, Nizamuddin West, New Delhi. But this is what is printed on Salma’s voter identity card.
After spending almost a month among tribals of Mandla in Madhya Pradesh, I can confidently say that by restricting ourselves to Public Distribution System (PDS), we cannot solve the food security i
We recently witnessed the shameful spectacle of a tribal girl’s death from starvation due to her inability to link her Aadhaar to her ration card. Once the media got hold of the story, all
Right to Food Campaign, Jharkhand, a civil society organisation, has claimed that Aadhaar disruption has caused another hunger death. Etwariya Devi, a 67-year-old widow, died
Milk is one liquid that usually moves upwards, at least in economic terms. The poor can’t afford this important source of nutrition. But imagine children getting milk in schools as part of mi
Pitta Rajani, 28, and her family from Kandriga in Vijaywada faced severe difficulties during and after the lockdown last year and had to take a loan of Rs 20,000 from Soubhagya , a moneyl
Shopkeepers, businessmen and traders in Pune, Satara, Kolhapur,Raigad, Ratnagiri and Sindhudurg district that were affected by devastating floods can look forward to some financial help from distri