New Delhi: The government on Thursday rejected the Planning Commission’s definition of poverty, with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh saying there was a need to devise another method.

The Planning Commission will constitute an expert group in three months to revisit the methodology for estimating poverty amid demand for removal of its Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia for p

It will not work at cross purposes with the Abhijit Sen committee: Ashwani Kumar

In a bid to address the rising concerns, within and outside Parliament, over the latest poverty estimates released by the Planning Commission, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday declared that a technical group would be put in place to come up a new methodology to capture the incidence of poverty.

The State Government told the Assembly on Wednesday it would request the Centre to relax population norms for districts not covered under Integrated Action Plan (IAP) for the Pradhan Mantri Gram S

New Delhi, 20 March: The government today said close to 70 per cent of funds under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) are used for water conservation and land d

As if to buttress Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's emphasis on drinking water and sanitation in his reply to the motion of thanks to the President's address, a young woman was rewarded for her successful insistence on a toilet as a precondition for living at her husband's place.

Anita Bai Narre of Chichouli village of Betul district in Madhya Pradesh was handed a cheque for Rs. 5 lakh by Union Minister of Rural Development Jairam Ramesh, on behalf of Sulabh International, for standing up for her dignity on reaching her husband's place and demanding the construction of a toilet.

The Planning Commission on Monday released the latest poverty estimates for the country showing a decline in the incidence of poverty by 7.3 per cent over the past five years and stating that anyone with a daily consumption expenditure of Rs. 28.35 and Rs. 22.42 in urban and rural areas respectively is above the poverty line.

The new poverty estimates for 2011-12 will only add to the furore triggered by the Commission's affidavit in the Supreme Court in October in which the BPL cap was pegged at an expenditure of Rs. 32 and Rs. 26 by an individual in the urban and rural areas respectively at the going rate of inflation in 2010-11.

New Delhi A 17% cut in the budgetary allocation for the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) for FY13 is a fallout of successive years of poor expenditure by states and allegations of diversion and misappropriation of funds.

“Considering that states have not been able to spend the budgeted amount in FY12 and even in the previous years, it’s only prudent to reduce allocation in MGNREGS and channel the funds towards some other schemes where the government needs to invest more,” said a senior government official.

New Delhi Allocation for UPA’s ambitious MNREGA scheme may have come down in the Union Budget but there would be no lack of funds for the rural job programme, rural development minister Jairam Ramesh said today. The allocation for the scheme entitling employment to poor rural households has been reduced from R40,000 crore in 2011-2012 to R33,000 crore in the Budget presented by finance minister Pranab Mukherjee for 2012-2013.

Half the country’s population may not have a toilet at home but it is not without a mobile phone.

Bringing to light this feature of the population, Census 2011 data on houses, household amenities and assets released today said 49.8 per cent of households defecated in the open. But 63.2 per cent households owned a telephone connection, 53.2 per cent of them a mobile.