Women-led and women’s rights organizations are on the frontlines of today’s humanitarian crises—but many are at risk of disappearing. As global needs rise due to conflict, climate change, and displacement, deep cuts to foreign aid are threatening organizations that provide life-saving services for women and girls. In March 2025, UN …
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. Down To Earth finds out how cash transfer works and how ready is India for the shift in the delivery of …
It is logical for India to be one of the few countries to spend about two per cent of its gross domestic product on the social sector. After all it hosts the world’s largest number of poor. But it sounds illogical that nearly three-fourths of it is the cost of …
Latin American countries were the first to flirt with the conditional cash transfer model. It evolved in response to the economic crisis of the 1990s. Many governments found that in the face of the crisis the poor were not availing themselves of education and health services. At the same time …
Madhya Pradesh is set to overhaul its public distribution system. It has decided to issue PDS users in the state with biometric cards so that no one can impersonate or fake identity. It will also replace food grain with food coupons. In August last year the state signed a Rs …
Five years and Rs 75,000 crore later, the Centre has asked states to start a physical trail of expenses incurred under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS). The move comes after the government found out that less than 5 per cent of the total 68.6 lakh works taken up …
The late Rajiv Gandhi famously, or infamously, once claimed that only 15 per cent of the funds allocated to welfare programmes ever reached the intended beneficiaries. The rest leaked enroute, entering the pockets of an assortment of intermediaries. This is a thought that the Union finance minister must always remember, …
Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda on Thursday said MGNREGA workers in the state would get Rs 179 minimum daily wage from January 1, 2011 as the Centre revised the wage rate. The chief minister welcomed the revision of minimum daily wage for MGNREGA workers and thanked UPA chairperson Sonia …
Working on a job site under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), Sakuna Bai is eagerly awaiting her next work payment to reach her State Bank of India account.
Village Panchayat, Kaluana in district Sirsa figures among the best 11 panchayats in the country selected for their better performance in the implementation of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee (MGNREGA) Scheme in 2009-10. While stating this here on Wednesday, an official spokesman said UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Prime …
On a bright January morning, Jaga Ram Garasia surveys his mustard fields in Chitrawas village with satisfaction. The crop is in full bloom, thanks to a good monsoon last year. But what he would much rather talk about is the past five years and how the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural …
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Wednesday said workers employed under the government's flagship rural jobs scheme, Mahatma Gandhi NREGA, would get higher wages to offset inflation. "We have decided to hike the wages as per the rise in consumer price index. This will raise the wages by 17 to 30 percent," …
Jaipur: Five years after it came into being, hundreds of NGOs and activists would come together to recount the success and failure of MGNREGA at Udyog Maidan near Statue Circle on Wednesday. The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act had come into effect on February 2, 2006. According to …
It was launched in 2006 to ensure livelihood security for the rural poor. Five years hence, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGS) has more aces up its sleeve: checking distress migration and being the world
This Social Assessment for the National Rural Livelihoods Project (NRLP) has been prepared after careful review and analysis of the experiences of previous state- and civil society-supported livelihood projects including World Bank-assisted livelihood projects. A comprehensive desk review was carried out of seven previous District Poverty Initiatives /Rural Livelihoods Projects …
Just two and half years ago, Kandhamal was India’s shame as a communal violence triggered by the killing of a Hindu seer left 38 people dead, thousands of houses and hundreds of churches burnt and vandalised and several thousand people scurrying to relief camps for safety. As Christian were slayed …
